


Till You Make It

by emilyray (emilyenrose)



Category: Panic At The Disco
Genre: High School, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-11-30
Updated: 2008-11-29
Packaged: 2017-10-07 23:04:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 22,870
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/70182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emilyenrose/pseuds/emilyray
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Brendon hasn't actually <i>liked</i> school since he was old enough to work out the difference between people laughing with you and people laughing at you, and the older he gets the more disconnected he feels from home as well. He was probably doomed from the start to have a shitty, shitty teenagerhood, considering.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks go to sociofemme for the beta!

Summer is just around the corner.

Brendon's junior year has been, by a pretty long way, the best out of all his years of high school so far. It's also been better than middle school. This is really not saying very much. Brendon hasn't actually _liked_ school since he was old enough to work out the difference between people laughing with you and people laughing at you, and the older he gets the more disconnected he feels from home as well. He was probably doomed from the start to have a shitty, shitty teenagerhood, considering.

There are two reasons why junior year has been the best year so far, and both of them are in band.

Mostly Brendon doesn't like the school band so much. A lot of the music they do is boring, boring shit. On the very rare occasions they do good stuff, Brendon's part is still mostly boring because he's stuck in the percussion section with the timpanis. Brendon's pretty keen on timpanis – enormous drums are a-okay by him – but it means he spends the occasional school concert standing around at the back of the hall waiting for the climax of whatever they're doing so he can go BUM-BUM-BUM-BA-DUM and then it's all over. He can never quite decide if that's better or worse than being in with the violins or something and having to play _Serenade for Strings_ for the seven gamillionth time while everyone's parents look either starry-eyed or stupefied with boredom depending on how many of these things they've been to.

But the teacher always lightens up after winter break and then they get to do some fun music. That's where Brendon's first reason comes in. The first reason why junior year has been better than all the years before it is Spencer Smith, who's the sophomore who plays the drum kit.

Spencer only comes to band practice every other week. Supposedly this is because his mom has a regular appointment with something-or-other and someone has to pick up his little sisters from school, but Spencer rolled his eyes when he told Brendon that story. Brendon knows that the real reason Spencer can get away with only turning up every other week is that he's better than the rest of the percussion section put together. When he's there, he's pretty awesome company. He doesn't talk a whole lot to most people – Spencer doesn't seem all that interested in most people – but for some reason he's decided he likes Brendon, and that means they pass the time while the teacher is yelling at the saxophones with chatting about nerdy shit – Spencer likes a lot of nerdy shit, they spend nearly three whole band practices on Star Wars – and bands Spencer likes, mostly bands Brendon's never heard of. After the first time they do that Spencer starts bringing CDs to practice when he shows up so that Brendon can take them home and listen to them. "You've got to be prepared when you meet Ryan," he says with a grin.

Ryan is Spencer's best friend, according to Spencer. Brendon has never seen any sign of him anywhere around the school and none of the sophomores Spencer hangs out with seem to have any special status in Spencer's eyes. Sometimes Brendon suspects that Ryan is, in fact, Spencer's imaginary friend. He doesn't say this to Spencer. Even with an imaginary friend, Spencer's still a pretty cool guy. He's kind of intent and intense when he drums in a way which Brendon thinks is really awesome to see.

The other reason why junior year sucks way less ass than most of Brendon's school career is Jon Walker. Jon is also in band. Jon's also in the percussion section. He's a senior who got roped in at the end of the first semester to play the triangle, and somehow he never got around to quitting again.

The triangle is a truly amazing musical instrument, Brendon thinks, like an automatic auditory anticlimax; the whole band goes swirling into noise and more noise, ratcheting up the tension, the teacher out front jumping around like a deranged frog and making insane faces while she conducts, and then the triangle comes in and goes 'ting!' When he first got roped in Jon gave Brendon a sideways look every time he had to play his one note, like he was saying, "...seriously?" At first Brendon thought Jon wasn't really looking at him, and then he thought maybe Jon was looking at him but he didn't know what to do about it, so he ignored it. It seemed to work, because Jon stopped looking at him. And that lasted until the rehearsal when they all did the same fifteen bars towards the end over and over again while the teacher shrieked mournfully, and Jon played his two tings dutifully, and after the second one he made a stupid baffled face of such truly epic proportions that Brendon seriously couldn't stop himself from snorting out loud. He tried to turn it into a cough, but Jon apparently heard anyway, because he flashed Brendon a huge grin, like he was saying _finally someone else gets how hilarious this thing is._

The teacher broke down in tears and commanded them all to leave, and Jon immediately got up and walked over to Brendon and said, "Finally someone else gets how hilarious this thing is."

"The triangle is _inherently_ hilarious," said Brendon.

"Right?" said Jon. "Ting!"

And just like that Brendon had a friend.

Unlike Spencer, Jon's there every week. "Why don't you quit?" Brendon asks him once.

Jon looks hurt and says, "Then who would play the triangle?"

"I guess there isn't really anyone else with your gift for it," Brendon admits, grinning.

"Yeah," says Jon. "I'm a triangle virtuoso."  
_

"Fuck," says Jon during practice one day.

The percussion section is being ignored this week, because Spencer isn't there and Jon and Brendon don't really do much. Jon gets a chair to sit on when he's playing the triangle, because it would be pretty mean to make him stand up the whole time, and Brendon has to be standing for the timpanis but for the rest of the time he theoretically gets a chair too. Generally he doesn't sit on it a whole lot. Sitting still is not something Brendon's known for being good at. Right now he can't really get up and run around the room four times or do a handstand until his face is red and he's dizzy from all the blood rushing the wrong way, or any of the other things he could do that he knows would get rid of some of the jiggling energy that builds up in him over the course of every single day, so he's experimenting with how far back he can get his chair to lean. Pretty far, he thinks. "What is it?" he says.

Jon's got his phone out and he's making a face at whatever he's reading on it. "Tom," he says, squinting at the phone like that'll change what it says.

Brendon doesn't really know Tom. He knows what Tom looks like – blond and stocky with floppy hair – but he's never spoken to him, and the only reason Brendon knows what Tom looks like is that he's a lame stalker-type person who watches Jon and his group of friends across the lunchroom at break. They always look like they're having fun. Brendon's pretty jealous. Sometimes he wishes he were brave enough to just go up and say hi, but just because Jon's nice doesn't mean his friends – who are all _seniors_, as well – are going to be. Band practice is not real life, Brendon knows that. "What'd he do?" he asks, to be polite. He's only a little bit curious. Jon's life isn't really his business. (That's a lie, well the first bit is, Brendon is _incredibly_ curious. But Jon's still not his business.)

"He's trying to make me bring a date to prom," says Jon. "He's got Greta in on it now. I'm _doomed_."

"Who's Greta?" says Brendon, and then, "Why have you got to bring a date? Weren't you going to anyway?"

"Oh, Greta's a really old friend," says Jon. "She's at the Catholic school now? But we were totally in kindergarten together." He makes a little frowny face. "Have you seriously not met her yet? Why not? You should hang out with us more, B."

"Yeah, well," says Brendon, which isn't an answer. "So are you going to take her to prom, then?"

"What? No!" says Jon. "I mean – wow, no, I love her but she's scary. And also kind of like my sister. But mostly scary. And if she's in on it then I don't have a choice and I've got to find someone. Fuuuuck." His phone beeps again and he goes pale when he reads the message. "She's threatening to start setting me up on blind dates," he says sadly. "I'm so doomed."

Brendon still doesn't see what the problem is. He's actually kind of jealous. Brendon's never had the kind of friend that tries to matchmake him with anyone. Brendon's never even kissed anyone. This is another one of the very long list of reasons why Jon is basically a lot cooler than Brendon. But Jon seems actually worried about the whole blind-date idea, so Brendon says, "Well, why don't you just ask someone? I bet there are lots of girls who'd go with you. What about, um, Meg? You know her, don't you?" Meg's a senior too, and every guy in the school knows _of_ her, since she's generally agreed to be gorgeous. Jon doesn't look all that happy about the prospect of Meg, though. "Um, those girls who hang out with you at lunch sometimes?" Brendon tries, rocking his chair back onto two legs again. He's getting it further back with every lean, now. "Katie? Charlotte?" It's probably pretty sad that Brendon knows their names.

"Yeah, I mean – Charlotte would go with me if I asked," says Jon. "It's not finding someone that's the problem. It's –" he sighs. "Did I tell you about Cass? I did, right?"

Brendon knows about the Cassie Thing. Cassie was Jon's girlfriend right through his sophomore and junior years, and Jon still looks a little bit regretful when he mentions her. Right at the start of last summer her parents moved to New Jersey, and Jon and Cassie were left trying to work out a long-distance relationship across half a continent. "It just... couldn't really work, you know?" Jon said the only time he really talked about it. "It wasn't that we didn't still care, it was just _miles_ and _miles_."

"I thought you were over her now, though?" says Brendon carefully. He lets his chair fall back forwards onto all four legs and slumps.

"They keep saying I'm moping," says Jon, sounding mildly outraged but mostly just confused. "Do I look like I'm moping to you?"

Brendon looks him up and down. "Yes," he says. "Wasting away. Duh." He kicks at the floor and starts rocking his chair back again. "Honestly, you're a shadow of your former self, Jonny Walker. We're all worried about you."

Jon chuckles. "Exactly. I'm fine, I'm just not in the mood at the moment, you know? Sometimes you're not. And I don't want to get set up with someone. I dunno. I might ask a guy. Like, it'd be more fun, you know? I don't really want to do the whole date thing and lead anyone on, that would be mean."

Brendon falls backwards off his chair.

He falls into the drums and that makes the teacher look up and start scolding him and he gets detention. This, Brendon thinks, is pretty unfair. After all, Jon was the one who just _took him completely by surprise._

They can't chat anymore now everyone's looking at them, but Jon keeps giving Brendon worried looks for the rest of band practice.  
_

"Hey, hey, B?" says Jon afterwards. "You're okay, right? Sorry I landed you in detention." He looks genuinely contrite.

"It's not your fault I'm a spaz," says Brendon awkwardly.

"Well, yeah, but I –" Jon stops. "I, uh, didn't realize that you didn't know I – um, I should maybe have said – look, I swing both ways. So. Now you know?" He looks nervous. "You're okay with that, right?"

"Um," says Brendon coherently. He's never actually known anyone who's – well, actually, maybe he has and no one bothered to tell him, since he's known Jon for most of the school year and apparently all along – and his first instinct is to say no. No, he's not okay with that. No, that's not okay.

But that would be _lying_. Jon is – for whatever reason – Brendon's friend. No way is Brendon giving that up. And more than that, Jon is basically a good guy. Brendon's sure of that. No one's got a bad word to say about him. He's funny and warm-hearted and kind. Brendon decides, suddenly and firmly, that he's okay with anything Jon does, and shoves both his hands deep into his pockets.

"I was just surprised," he says defensively. "Of course I'm okay with it. Asshole."

Jon laughs, but it sounds relieved too. "So I'm just thinking," he says cautiously, "about prom, a guy would be less likely to..."

"...fall for you?" finishes Brendon after a moment.

Jon scratches at the back of his neck. "No! I wasn't thinking like _that_, exactly, just – I need someone who I can act like I'm into enough to get Tom and Greta off my back without –"

"Without actually being into them," says Brendon.

"Well," says Jon. "Yeah." He grins ruefully. "It sounds kind of bad when you put it like that, dude."

"No, I get it," says Brendon. "It's like you're pranking Tom and Greta, almost, right?"

"Good one," says Jon, and claps Brendon on the shoulder. "I just have to find a guy who'll play along."

Brendon tries to show willing, tries to think of Jon's friends. Again, he knows their names, but he feels a little bit less lame this time, because Jon talks about them a lot, so it's not like he's been Facebook stalking or anything. "What about Sean?"

Jon starts to laugh really hard, his eyes crinkling up and his face going red. "Oh man, no," he pants at last, "Tom would kill my face, B, and anyway Sean can't lie to save his life."

Brendon grins – because he _can_ tell the difference between laughing-with and laughing-at, and Jon's not being mean – and says, "Well, I didn't know that. What about the guy with the, um," Brendon gestures at his own head, "hair?"

"The – oh, you mean Al?" says Jon. "That'd look suspicious, though, Al's way out of my league."

"He is not!" says Brendon, and then stops, surprised at his own vehemence. He supposes that, objectively speaking, Jon's friend Al is hot. He's kind of... lean, and dark, and he has... Brendon thinks they're called dreadlocks? But – if Brendon's being objective – Jon's pretty hot too. Not in the same drop-dead-gorgeous way, but he's got... shoulders, and this kind of slow easy smile that comes out when you've just said something he really likes, and when he laughs he throws his head back. It's... Jon's plenty hot. "I don't think he's out of your league," Brendon says.

"Thanks, B," says Jon with a grin, "but I'm not sure I'm gonna get anywhere there. Anyway I think he's got a date already." He thinks about it. "Actually, I think he's got three."

"Really?" says Brendon, distracted and fascinated. "And... they're okay with that?"

"Well, I don't know," says Jon thoughtfully. "Two of them know about each other, but I'm not sure about the other one. You get the idea, though. Al's out." He makes a face. "I just hope I can find someone soon. The faster I get Tom off my case, the less time Greta has to plot."

"Well, there's always –" begins Brendon, and then cuts himself off sharply – not even on purpose, it's just that his brain just caught up with his mouth and is too shocked at itself to keep going.

"Who?" says Jon.

"I was –" Brendon starts, his tongue feeling weirdly heavy and floppy in his mouth, and then suddenly his jaw comes unstuck as his brain bubbles through the whole thing super-fast and he finishes, "-going to say I'd do it. If you like."

He doesn't know what makes him say it. Obviously he's not really... well, _obviously_. It's probably got something to do with the way Brendon is ridiculously insecure and pathetically grateful for Jon's friendship, and here's a chance to pay him back. It's probably the fact that Jon gets this little crease in between his eyebrows when he's frustrated and Brendon feels bad for him. It's probably just a stupid impulse. But even as he's saying it he can see how it would be pretty funny - and hey, here's a _benefit_ of sorts to Jon's friends not really knowing Brendon, cause it means the trick will work. "I could definitely do it," he says. "It'd be pretty funny to fool them, right?"

Watching Jon's face is like watching someone turn up the dimmer switch on a light, slowly getting brighter and brighter, as he thinks about it. "Hey, that would –" he says, "that could actually work. Seriously? You're okay to do it? It's just the one night you really have to hang out with me." He grins at Brendon. "Dancing and drinking spiked punch, I hear it's not all bad."

"Well, you know," Brendon takes his hands out of his pockets so he can clasp them in front of him, "I'd do anything if I could go to prom!" He flutters his eyelashes while he says it. Then he waggles his eyebrows up and down for good measure. Jon cracks up and Brendon feels pretty pleased with himself.

It's one night. One night of hanging out with Jon and, okay, pretending to be his date, but how hard can that be? And Jon seems really really pleased, in a sort of surprised way that will make Brendon feel a little sad when he thinks about it later, and knocks his shoulder against Brendon's a couple of times as they walk down to the parking lot together.  
_

Jon's waiting beside Brendon's locker the very next morning.

Brendon startles when he sees him there and automatically looks around to see which of Jon's friends is with him, but the only one he can see is Tom at the other end of the corridor. And it's definitely Brendon's locker Jon is waiting by. "Hi," says Brendon, going over to him.

"Hey, B," says Jon. He drops his voice and murmurs, "Can Tom hear us?"

Brendon feels surprised and probably looks it, but he glances up at where Tom was and sees he's a good way away from them, and the corridor is full of noisy high schoolers. He won't hear whatever it is Jon wants to say. "Nope," Brendon says. "He's all the way over there. What is it?"

Jon looks apologetic. "Basically, well, Tom and Greta turned up at my _house_ last night, and Greta had a whole plan of action worked out with step-by-step diagrams and everything and it was pretty scary so I kind of told them I'd already asked someone." The last bit comes out all in a rush.

"Oh," says Brendon. "Well, you did." He puts the tips of his fingers in his pockets and shifts from foot to foot on the spot a little. He's trying not to be too spazzy. Jon has already seen Brendon being spazzy so that's probably a lost cause, but Brendon's uncomfortably aware that Tom is not so much _standing_ at the far end of the corridor as he is _lurking_, and he keeps shooting Jon and Brendon glances that are probably meant to be subtle. It's making the hair on the back of Brendon's neck prickle a little bit. "What's the problem?"

"Well, they got really interested when I said it was a guy," Jon says. "And Greta wanted to know how we met and," he scratches at the back of his neck, "how long I'd liked you and what you look like, stuff like that, and I kind of told them who you were, and then they left and," he makes an embarrassed face, "called up everyone I've ever known, the fuckers, and now all my friends keep texting me and telling me I've got to bring my boyfriend to the diner tonight so they can meet you, so," he shrugs, bites his lip, widens his eyes, looking hopeful, "will you come?"

"To... the diner?" says Brendon. He's not really asking. He's kind of just _repeating_.

Jon perks up a bit. "Yeah! It's pretty good, we just go and hang out there in the evenings sometimes – like, my friends – there's not really that many of us, we just get smoothies and hang out. It's good," he says. He sounds kind of like he's trying to sell it to Brendon. "It's really good, it's a good time. You should come."

This is weirdly like being asked on an _actual_ date by Jon Walker, Brendon thinks, and then he snorts when he realizes that's exactly what's happening. Tom's watching creepily, so Jon is asking his fake boyfriend out on a fake date so the plan doesn't get spoiled and Greta doesn't get to put her step-by-step diagrams into action. Brendon relaxes a little once he gets it and starts to grin. "I'd love to," he says, and reaches out without letting himself think about it – all an act, all an act, all an _act_ – and touches Jon's hand quickly. Jon's already smiling, but his smile widens at the touch. "Thanks for asking me," Brendon says, and Jon says, "No, thank you," and grins at him in a stupid relieved way. Then he says, "Shit, I have to get to class."

"Yeah, me too," says Brendon. "I – I guess I'll see you later?"

"I'll pick you up this evening," says Jon. "Is six okay? Shit, I don't have your phone number. Quick," he pulls his phone out of his pocket and shoves it at Brendon, "here, give me yours."

Brendon puts his number into Jon's phone fast, but Jon's faster and drops Brendon's phone back into his open bag while Brendon's still tapping in the last couple of digits. "Great," says Jon. "Thanks. Call me!"

"Okay," Brendon starts to say, but Jon's already halfway down the corridor. Brendon sees Tom step away from the wall where he's still slouching in a kind of creepy homeless way, and Jon falls into step with him, starting to say something, as the two of them disappear together to whatever class it is they've got.

Brendon picks up his schoolbag. He's going to be late to class. The corridor's nearly empty, but there are a couple of sophomore girls who pass him going the other way, and they look at him oddly.  
_

Brendon starts to panic a couple of hours later. He can't think of anyone to panic _at_ – now would be a good time to have some actual friends who are _in his classes_ and stuff – so he fires off a text to Spencer between classes, **hlp im n so mch truble!!!**

Spencer texts him back halfway through math class. Brendon's phone makes a loud noise and the teacher glares at him and he tries to sink lower in his chair. Normally Brendon _likes_ math, too. His foot jiggles nervously against the desk leg while he waits for a good moment to reach for his phone and check what Spencer's written.

In the end he can't check until class ends. He scrabbles through his bag for his phone as soon as the teacher dismisses them and nearly drops it getting it open. Spencer's text says **wtf? tel me @ lunch**

Brendon is kind of a nervous wreck by the time he actually manages to find Spencer at lunch. He drops his bag on the floor by Spencer's feet, sits down on the bench next to him and says, "Oh my god I'm an idiot."

"Yes," says Spencer. "You are. What's the matter?"

Brendon puts his face in his hands and says, "Mrrrfgle drffgle mrff."

"I'm sorry, I can't hear you over the sound of pathetic," Spencer tells him. "Try that again."

Brendon has no idea why it is that this actually makes him feel better. Spencer's superpowers defy all logic and reason. He lifts his head up and says, "I've got a date with Jon."

Spencer snorts orange juice through his nose.

It's hilarious and makes Brendon feel a _lot_ better, even as he starts waving his hands around uselessly and going, "No, not, I didn't mean, not like that!"

Spencer keeps choking for a while and Brendon starts to pound him on the back until Spencer shoves him away and says, "Stop it!" He takes a couple of deep breaths, still sounding kind of congested, and then says, "Okay, all right, I'm ready. Shoot."

"Um," says Brendon.

"You've got a date with Jon Walker from band," Spencer prompts, and then adds, "What the hell, Urie, I wasn't sure you even –"

"I don't!" says Brendon. "At least, I mean – look, it's not like that," and the whole ridiculous story comes pouring out of him. Spencer just sits there, with his left eyebrow going up and up and up, and Brendon finishes miserably, "and now I've got to go meet his friends this evening and they're going to hate me."

"Why would they hate you?" says Spencer.

He sounds honestly mystified, which is kind of flattering, but then Brendon knows Spencer has never cared much about the complicated social strata of high school. Spencer just does his own thing and doesn't seem to care much whether people think it's cool or not, and somehow it works for him. Spencer is way more confident and together than any sophomore has any right to be, Brendon thinks. So Brendon has to explain, patiently, "Jon's cool. Jon's _friends_ are cool. And I'm obviously not good enough for him, so they'll hate me."

"Jon's not _that_ cool. Cool doesn't play the triangle in band," objects Spencer reasonably, and then he says, "Wait, good enough for him? I thought you weren't actually dating him?"

"They don't know that!" says Brendon. Spencer is seriously completely useless. Why doesn't Brendon have better friends? Why doesn't Brendon have _any_ other friends? "What the fuck, I promised him I could pull this off, it's never going to work and then he'll have to go to prom with Greta's twelve-step plan and he'll be sad." That seems like the worst part of all, somehow. Being hated by Jon's friends is going to suck but it's not like Brendon's not used to them not talking to him. Making Jon sad is much much worse, because Jon actually _is_ Brendon's friend.

"Hey – hey – Brendon, calm down!" says Spencer, sounding pretty worried, and Brendon realizes that Spencer's been talking for a while now and he missed most of it because he was busy panicking all over again. "Look, if you want to fool them, you can do it. I know you can. We just have to," he pauses and thinks about it, "okay, I know what to do. We need Ryan."

"I don't think your imaginary friend is going to be much use," says Brendon glumly.

"What?" says Spencer. He's already got his phone out. "My who?" And then he says, "Ryan, hey, emergency. I've got a friend who needs your help. We're cutting class for the afternoon."

"We're _what?_" says Brendon, but Spencer's already told his phone, "See you there," and hung up. "Right, Urie," he says, "let's do this thing."

"What are we doing?" says Brendon pathetically.

"Well, I'm going to stand around and point and laugh," says Spencer, "but Ryan will help you out."  
_

Brendon is still not entirely convinced that Ryan is not imaginary.

Sure, Brendon can see him too, but that doesn't necessarily make him real, it just means that Brendon and Spencer are having a shared hallucination. Or that Brendon is suddenly taking part in Spencer's extended hallucination, since Spencer does seem to know him pretty well, judging by the way he grins and starts talking nineteen to the dozen when they meet Ryan at the mall. There are several things that point to Ryan's likely imaginary status, like the smeared brown makeup around his eyes, and the fact that he's wearing a button-up shirt with a kind of scarf-thing instead of a tie, and his shiny, shiny shoes, and his messy hair which points straight up like he's stuck his finger in an electric socket, apparently on purpose. Brendon has never met anyone real who looks or acts anything like Ryan, and so he decides to go with hallucination-until-proven-otherwise.

Spencer explains the mess Brendon's in to Ryan. At first Ryan's mouth just quirks at the corners, and then his smile gets wider and wider and wider until he's grinning in fascinated delight. Brendon is really not sure how Ryan's going to be any help if he's just going to laugh at Brendon's predicament.

But when Spencer's done, after Ryan's done laughing, he turns to Brendon and looks him up and down. His eyes are sharp and considering under the smudged brown makeup, and he folds his arms and purses his lips and taps one of his shiny shoes on the floor in a one-two-three-four beat that makes Brendon nervous because it's ever-so-slightly out of time. He sees Spencer make a little wincing face too. Then Ryan says, "Okay, yeah, I can work with this."

"You can?" says Brendon. "I mean - what?" The mall is pretty empty at this time of day, and most of the people who are there are middle-aged women. They give Ryan and Brendon and Spencer dirty looks as they walk past them.

"What you need is confidence," says Ryan with certainty. "And the best way to be confident is to wear the right clothes."

Brendon feels kind of dubious about this.

"No, trust me," says Ryan, and starts walking. "This way. Trust me, it _helps_. If you know you _look_ hot then you _feel_ hot and then it gets way way easier to fake all the rest of it."

"Like you'd know," says Brendon. "You _are_ confident." No one in the world, Brendon thinks, could go out in public with their hair looking like that if they weren't already overflowing with faith in themselves.

Spencer starts to laugh. Ryan just smiles at Brendon. His eyes are friendly despite the makeup. "Yeah," he says, "no."

He leads them into one of the clothes shops, gives Brendon another assessing look, and then starts pulling pairs of jeans off the shelves and shoving them into Brendon's arms. Brendon looks down at what he's holding. "Uh," he says, "these are a size too small for me."

"Stone-washed denim, bleached denim, black denim, indigo," chants Ryan, pulling more things off the shelves, "what? Shut up. Spence, take these. Classic, boot-cut, flared, _skinny_, okay, now we're in business."

Brendon finds himself hustled into the changing rooms, past the bored-looking attendant who perks up a little at the sight of Ryan, and pushed into a cubicle. Spencer, as promised, is already snickering. Ryan flicks cursorily through the huge pile of cloth they've brought with them and tugs out a pair of dark blue jeans with zips on the pockets. "Yeah, these," he says. "I'm pretty sure."

"Then why did you bring all the others?" Brendon asks.

"In case I'm wrong," says Ryan. "Go on, try them on."

Brendon meets Spencer's eyes. Spencer rolls his eyes and shrugs, but he looks kind of fond every time he looks at Ryan. Brendon's starting to see that he wasn't really kidding about the best-friends thing; he's never seen Spencer look this consistently amused and interested by anyone at school.

"Um," he says. "Are you guys just going to... stand there?"

Ryan looks blank. Spencer rolls his eyes again and says, "Give the man some privacy, Ryan."

Ryan still looks confused, like _what? Privacy? What is that?_ But Spencer puts his hand around Ryan's arm – it goes all the way around, because Ryan is stick-thin – and hustles him out of the cubicle. Brendon eyes the jeans with misgivings. They are definitely a size too small for him.

On the other hand, Spencer and Ryan did both cut school to get him here, and Ryan keeps going 'trust me' in a really, really earnest way. Brendon thinks Spencer might be upset if he didn't go along with it. He pulls his own faded jeans down and kicks them off and starts to tug the stiff new ones on.

After a moment he pokes his head out through the cubicle curtain and says, "Um, they don't fit."

Spencer is sitting sprawled on the one chair in the changing room, looking bored. Ryan's eyebrows draw together in a frown. "Can you get them done up?" he says.

"Well, yeah," says Brendon, "but –"

"Let's take a look," Ryan orders.

Brendon steps out of the cubicle, feeling extremely stupid and a little uncomfortable. Ryan's eyebrows go up. "Twirl around," he dictates. Brendon holds out his arms and rotates on the spot. "See?" he says. "They don't fit."

When he gets back around to facing Ryan and Spencer again, Ryan's eyebrows are raised. "Oh yes they do," he says firmly. "Right, Spence?" Spencer nods. "Don't even think about arguing."

"But –"

"Hey, excuse me?" Ryan calls out to the changing room attendant. "Could we get another opinion here?"

Brendon looks over at the attendant just as the guy glances up and gives Brendon a long, slow once-over. His smile has teeth. "Nice ass!" he comments.

"See?" says Ryan to Brendon, whose face is now _burning_. "They're hot. Buy them."

Brendon has absolutely no idea how he ended up in this situation. He just wanted some advice on how to avoid making an idiot of himself in front of all Jon's friends so Jon wouldn't hate him. 'Get leered at by a shop assistant guy' was definitely not on his list of things to do today, and yet.

"You want to wear those?" says the guy. "I can take the tags off for you, no problem."

"I –"

"Yeah, that would be great," interrupts Ryan, and he flashes the guy a smile. Brendon gives Spencer a beseeching look. Spencer's got his hand over his mouth to hold back his giggles. "Get your other jeans, Brendon, we're going."

Brendon says, "I'm _wearing_ my other jeans," as firmly as he can, and dives back into the cubicle before Ryan can convince him otherwise. When he gets out again, Ryan is chatting to the attendant. He keeps the conversation going right through Brendon and Spencer going to the till and buying the new jeans – which are kind of expensive, and Brendon looks at the price that flashes up on the till with dismay – and doesn't rejoin them until they're about to leave the shop. In the line for the cashier Brendon whispers to Spencer, "Is Ryan – um –"

Ryan definitely _acts_ – well, Brendon would have guessed Ryan before he would have guessed Jon. But Spencer just looks a bit surprised. "No, don't think so," he says. "Ryan's straight. He just really likes dressing people." He nudges Brendon. "He's cool, right?"

Brendon isn't sure if Spencer's really asking him or if he's just checking whether Brendon's opinion of his best friend is the correct one. Either way the answer's easy. "He's awesome," Brendon says.

Spencer grins. "I knew I liked you."

Outside the store Brendon hefts the bag with his new jeans in it and says, "I can't really spend any more money."

"That's okay," says Ryan, who's finally rejoined them. "We'll lend you stuff."

"Make a new friend?" asks Spencer, jerking his head back at the store.

"Huh? Oh, yeah. We were talking about music. He likes some cool stuff."

"You know he was hitting on you, right?"

"What?" says Ryan, looking baffled. "Was he?"

Spencer starts laughing. After a second Brendon joins in. Ryan puts his head down, smiling ruefully at his own shiny shoes, and says, "I just never notice."  
_

They go back to Spencer's house. Brendon's never been to Spencer's house before, and Spencer's forgotten his key, but Ryan, as it turns out, has his own. "We've been friends since I was four," Spencer tells Brendon. "We kind of unofficially adopted him, and he's over here all the time, so Mom said he might as well have a key." Brendon nods. The story sounds sort of like there are bits missing – like, for example, _why_ the Smiths thought Ryan needed adopting when Ryan's presumably got a family of his own – but it doesn't seem like it would be a good idea to ask.

Spencer leads them up to his bedroom where Ryan immediately starts rooting through the closet. Brendon's about to ask if Spencer's okay with Ryan helping himself to Spencer's clothes, and then Ryan pulls out an armful of button-up shirts which don't look like anything Brendon's ever seen Spencer wear and what he says instead is, "You keep your clothes at Spencer's house?"

"There isn't room for all of them at his," says Spencer dryly.

Ryan snorts but doesn't argue. Instead he turns around and eyes Brendon, and then holds up a couple of shirts, dropping the rest on the floor. "White or blue?" he says to Spencer.

Spencer says, "I don't know that he can pull off your kinds of shirts anyway, to be honest."

The white shirt Ryan's holding has ruffles on it, and the blue one has a delicate floral pattern. Brendon kind of agrees with Spencer.

Ryan sighs. "I cut school to create art, and how do you repay me?" he laments, but he doesn't sound serious. "Fine, but your clothes won't fit him. Give me a moment." He glances at Brendon and adds, "Why are you still wearing those jeans? Those are the wrong jeans."

"Um, okay," says Brendon, but Ryan's already disappeared through Spencer's bedroom door. "Where is he going?" Brendon asks plaintively.

Spencer shrugs. "So when are you meeting Jon?" he asks instead.

"He's supposed to be picking me up at six," Brendon says, distracted instantly from Ryan's mysteries. He sits down on Spencer's bed, is interested for a moment by the Batman bedspread, and then remembers his real problems and forgets about it again. His foot starts jiggling nervously. "Spencer, I think maybe this is all a really bad idea."

"Don't be dumb," says Spencer. "It's too late now. And anyway it's Jon, what could go wrong?" Brendon opens his mouth to point out that _everything_ could go wrong, but Spencer holds up a hand and cuts him off with, "Seriously. I know you have issues or whatever, but listen, Urie, Jon's _nice_. He likes you, you like him, you're friends, and he's not the kind of guy to hang out with assholes. It's going to be fine."

"Okay," says Brendon, and then he takes a deep breath and repeats, "Okay."

"And change your jeans," Spencer tells him, smirking. "You don't want to spoil Ryan's fun."

Brendon is starting to suspect that this whole idea of Spencer's was more about Ryan's fun than helping Brendon out.

When Ryan comes back Brendon's wearing the new, tight jeans – they are _seriously_ constricting – and no shirt. (Brendon actually really likes being naked, or close-to-naked, especially in summer when his body's tendency to be super-sweaty all the time gets seriously disgusting.) He's also bouncing up and down on Spencer's bed a little while they talk about Batman. "No, the _best_ Robin," Brendon says, "was the first one, okay, the little acrobat dude, he could do all these somersaults and things, and he acted like he was actually having fun." If Brendon was fighting crime with circus tricks in the mean streets of Gotham, he'd be having fun, definitely. Spencer says, "I don't know, he's kind of unrealistic," and Brendon counters, "He's the sidekick of a guy who dresses up as a _bat_ and then goes out and kicks ass! Where's the realism supposed to be, huh?"

Ryan coughs. "You finally found someone as nerdy as you are," he tells Spencer, and then he tosses something at Brendon. "Here, put this on."

Brendon doesn't argue, just tugs it over his head, making his glasses go skewed. It's tight and white and leaves a little strip of skin exposed at the small of his back, but Brendon learned his lesson with the jeans and doesn't bother trying to say it doesn't fit. Instead he adjusts his glasses and says, "Is that okay?"

Spencer's staring at him. After a moment he turns to Ryan and demands, "Is that my _sister's?_"

Ryan ignores him and gestures for Brendon to stand up. Brendon shifts his weight nervously from foot to foot, and Ryan puts his head on one side and says, "What's that on your shoes?"

Brendon looks down at his sneakers but doesn't see anything wrong with them. "Uh, a smiley face?" he says. "And a sad one." They're drawn in black marker on the toes of each shoe. Brendon explains, "I did the sad one in band practice because we were going to be kept late, and then Jon said I shouldn't have sad sneakers and he did the other one."

Ryan and Spencer exchange a glance. Ryan says, "You did say _fake_ date, right?"

"What?" says Brendon.

He doesn't get to say any more than that because suddenly his phone rings. Brendon thinks _oh shit, my parents_ but when he looks at the display it's Jon calling. He's entered himself in the phone as **jwalk :-)**. Brendon's still laughing at the smiley face when he answers.

"Hey, B," says Jon. "Oh, hey, what's funny?"

"Nothing," says Brendon, getting his giggles under control. "Sorry, hi! Hi! Is everything okay?"

"Yeah, of course," says Jon. "I was just calling you to check – six o'clock, right? I looked for you at lunch but you weren't there."

"Oh, sorry," says Brendon, feeling guilty. "I was – I'm hanging out with Spencer? We cut school."

("I cut school _too_," Ryan says, sounding aggrieved. Spencer nudges him to be quiet.)

"Cutting school, Mr Urie? Why, you hardened rebel," says Jon. "And you're so young, too." Brendon laughs. "Is Spence there?" says Jon. "Tell him I say hi."

"Jon says hi," Brendon says, and then he puts his hand over the phone and whispers quickly, "Is it okay if I tell him to pick me up from here? My parents –"

Spencer nods, getting it. Brendon puts the phone back to his ear and says, "Hey, can you pick me up from Spencer's?"

"Sure," says Jon. "Address?"

Brendon repeats the address as Spencer dictates it to him, and then he says, "Six?" and Jon says, "Six," and Brendon says, "Okay, I guess I'll see you at six!" and Jon says, "Okay, I'll see you later," and they're in that awkward bit at the end of a phone conversation where no one wants to be the one to hang up first, and then in the background someone on Jon's end yells, "Hey, Jon, is that your boyfriend on the line?"

"Shut up!" says Jon loudly, sounding embarrassed, and Brendon bursts out laughing, shaking his head at Ryan and Spencer when they look curious. There's the sound of a scuffle coming down the phone line, and then a voice Brendon doesn't recognize says mock-menacingly right into his ear, "You'd better treat him right, Mysterious Band Dude," and then starts yelling and laughing as the scuffling noises start up again. Jon finally manages to snatch the phone back and says, "Hey, B, sorry about that."

Brendon's still grinning. "It's okay," he says, and then a worrying thought occurs to him and he adds, "Hey, your friends aren't going to – I mean, like – " He thinks the fake menace thing won't be nearly as funny if Jon's friends are doing it to his face.

"They'd _better_ not," says Jon with emphasis, and in the background someone says something muffled, laughing and apologetic. "No one's gonna be mean to you, B, I promise."

"Yeah, okay," says Brendon. He suddenly feels better about the whole fake date thing than he has all day. "Thanks, Jon."

Jon drops his voice and says, "Hey, it's my fault you have to do this at all. Don't worry, okay?"

Brendon finds himself smiling stupidly even though Jon can't see him. "I won't," he says. "See you later."

"Looking forward to it," Jon says, and then the phone clicks as he hangs up.

Spencer's room is oddly quiet. Brendon looks up to find both Spencer and Ryan observing him curiously, like he's a lizard in a tank or something. "What?" he says.

"Are you really sure that it's –" begins Ryan, and then stops when Spencer claps a hand over his mouth. Brendon blinks confusedly at them both.

"You should call your parents and tell them you're going to be getting dinner with some people from school so they don't freak out," Spencer tells him. "And then we should all play Xbox."

"Uh, okay," says Brendon.

Spencer nods, and then he says, "Ugh, Ryan, fuck!"

Brendon jumps. Ryan, his mouth newly freed from Spencer's hand, says, "You shouldn't take risks if you can't take the consequences," smugly.

Spencer says, "You fucking licked me, Ross!"

Ryan says, "You were the one with your hand all up in my face, what did you expect?" Spencer is wiping his hand off on his pants with a disgusted expression.

Ryan and Spencer are kind of weird, thinks Brendon, but in a cool way.   
_

At ten to six Brendon and Spencer are on round six of an epic Mario Kart battle which Brendon is actually losing pretty spectacularly, when Ryan says, "Don't mind me," and dribbles something gloopy and wet into Brendon's hair from a bottle.

Brendon jumps, drops the controller, yelps, and loses the race. Spencer looks smug as he guides his guy round the last curve to victory, and Brendon says, "Ryan, why?" sadly.

"I said _don't_ mind me," Ryan points out. "I'm just fixing your hair."

"Is there something wrong with it?" asks Brendon automatically, and then his brain catches up with what Ryan just said and he says nervously, "Not like yours, please," rolling his eyes up like he can see what Ryan's hands are doing with the gel that way.

Ryan snorts and says, "You haven't got enough hair to do it like mine, don't worry. I'm just spiking it up a bit."

"Why?" says Brendon nervously.

"To make you look hotter," says Ryan.

Brendon had kind of forgotten how this whole afternoon started over the course of the last couple of hours of video games, but now it comes rushing back to him. He's wearing the tightest jeans he could squeeze into and one of Spencer's sisters' t-shirts and now, apparently, there is going to be hair gel, and Brendon isn't sure he's even capable of looking hot. He probably just looks stupid. But he bites his lip and waits for Ryan to do his thing, and Ryan walks around Brendon and pokes at his hair a bit from the front, and then he steps back and puts his hands on his hips and says, "Ha, I am brilliant. Spencer, am I brilliant?"

"You're all right," Spencer allows.

"I'm amazing," says Ryan.

Brendon shifts uncomfortably and says, "I don't know –"

Ryan grabs him by the arm and pulls him to his feet. Then he drags him out across the hallway and into what Brendon suspects is Spencer's parents' bedroom. There's a full-length mirror on the wardrobe door and Ryan pushes Brendon to stand in front of it and says proudly, "Look!"

Brendon looks.

The guy in the mirror doesn't look much like him. He's still small like Brendon, and he's still got Brendon's dark hair and heavy-framed glasses and too-big mouth, but he's... Brendon puts his hands behind his back and squares his shoulders. Different. He looks like someone a guy as hot as Jon might conceivably want to make out with.

Brendon's reflection's face flushes red while he's thinking that.

He looks away from the mirror. Looking like someone good enough for Jon was the plan, wasn't it? Ryan's practically rubbing his hands together in glee. "I'm so good at this," he says happily.

"Um, yeah," says Brendon. "I... thanks." His voice goes quiet on the _thanks_ without him meaning it to.

"Hey," says Ryan, giving him a sideways look and then putting his arm carefully around Brendon's shoulders. "My pleasure, okay? You should hang out with Spence and me more often."

Brendon hesitates and then gives Ryan a quick hug. He's not completely sure about the etiquette of hugging people who aren't family – he's made mistakes there before – but Ryan seems like he'll be okay about it. Ryan hugs him back, anyway, and that's good. Before either of them can say anything else, Spencer yells, "Brendon, your phone!" from the other room, and Brendon realizes it's six somehow already and Jon's just texted him and he's got to go.


	2. Chapter 2

Jon's car is parked outside Spencer's house. It's ancient and beaten-up and has three long scratches down one side. "Yeah," says Jon, "Don't ask." He grins over at Brendon from the driver's seat. "It's not exactly luxury, sorry."

"If this were a real date," says Brendon, "I'd expect a Porsche."

Jon nods. "Definitely," he says. "And I'd have brought you flowers. Roses?" He cocks his head and looks at Brendon. Brendon strikes a pose. "Yeah, you strike me as a roses kind of guy," says Jon, grinning. "Maybe just the one, like, with a stem. I'll get you roses on prom night, okay?"

Brendon laughs, and Jon's grin gets wider, his eyes crinkling at the corners. "This is going to be great," he says. "Okay, let's go."

Brendon's never thought of Jon as a really talkative guy – though no one's talkative compared to Brendon – but he chats through most of the drive. Mostly he's telling Brendon about the people who are going to be at the diner. "It's no one weird, don't worry," he says. "Tom's the only one who's gonna look at you twice, and Tom's basically a flake, Sean'll distract him after a minute. Not on purpose," Jon elaborates quickly. "Tom's just easily distracted by Sean."

"Are they -?" asks Brendon carefully.

Jon just shrugs, which makes the car do a slightly worrying wobble in the middle of the road, and says, "Don't ask me. Tom's got a girlfriend? But I think they've got an exception or something."

There is apparently a lot more gayness going on at Brendon's high school than he ever realized.

"Sean and Al and Luciani are all cool," says Jon. "If Nick tries to borrow money from you, don't give it to him. Max'll be there – actually, maybe you know Max, I think he's a junior? He's Danielle's younger brother. Danielle's Tom's girlfriend, she'll be there."

Brendon just nods, trying to fix all the names in his head. It's not easy. He's going to be so confused. "That's all the core people," says Jon, "except – oh, hey, you'll get to meet Greta, she usually shows up."

"Greta's the scary one?" says Brendon.

"Greta's awesome," says Jon firmly, but then he gives Brendon an embarrassed look and admits, "but yeah, scary. And that'll be everyone unless Pete crashes."

"Who's Pete?" Brendon starts to ask, but Jon's already distracted by parking the car. The diner is a shabby little building on the street corner, but it's brightly lit up inside. It doesn't look that busy. Jon waits for Brendon to hop out of the car and knocks his shoulder against Brendon's when they're both standing on the curb. "Ready?" he says.

"Let's do this," says Brendon.

Jon grabs Brendon's hand, all casually, when they walk through the door, and Brendon is suddenly nervous again and his palm starts to get sweaty almost at once. He feels weirdly exposed in his tight jeans and girl t-shirt, and when a round of wolf-whistles and clapping starts up from the table in the corner he feels himself start to go red, but Jon glances at him and doesn't let go. Somehow that helps, and Brendon clings to Jon's hand like a lifeline and lets Jon twine their fingers together. Jon's skin is warm and his fingers have calluses – guitar calluses, actually, Brendon recognizes them with a jolt of surprise, how come he didn't know that? – and he holds Brendon's hand tighter as they walk over to the table. He doesn't let Brendon go.

Of course he doesn't, Brendon thinks. They're supposed to be pretending to be boyfriends right now. Jon's friends are all eyeing him with interest, and wow, did he ever not think this through.

Jon gives his hand a squeeze. "Hey, guys," he says, "this is Brendon. B – that's Sean, Tom, Danielle, Al, Ryan J, Nick, Max – hey, where's Greta?"

"Not here yet," says Danielle. "All right, shove up, guys!"

There's some general elbowing and pushing as everyone squeezes a little closer together to make room for Jon and Brendon, and Brendon finds himself shoved in at one end of the table with Jon pressed warm and comforting against him from thigh to shoulder on one side, and Tom Conrad on the other being equally warm but much less comforting. Brendon goes to run his fingers through his own hair nervously, remembers that his hair is full of gel, remembers that he read somewhere that touching your face is a dead giveaway that you're nervous, and tries to put both his hands flat on the table.

Jon leans down and whispers right in Brendon's ear, "It's okay, B." He's so close that Brendon can feel his breath puff out warm and a little damp. He ducks his head. Jon reaches for one of his hands, pulls it under the table and gives it a squeeze, and Brendon turns his head to give Jon a smile.

From across the table the guy Jon called Nick says, "Okay, you guys, that's disgusting. Do the PDA on your own time."

"Fuck you, Nick," says Jon easily.

"No, listen, you can do the lovebird thing later," Nick says. "I need to talk to you, Walker – five minutes?"

Jon hesitates, glancing at Brendon, but then he says, "Okay," and he gets up. Nick has to fight his way out from the middle of the squash of people on his side of the table, but the instant he's free he grabs Jon's arm and tugs him over to the other side of the room to talk to him in a quiet, urgent voice. Brendon stares after Jon forlornly. He wasn't expecting to be abandoned this fast. Then he realizes the rest of the table has started laughing, and he jerks his attention back to them, panicked.

Ryan J smiles at him across the table. "Nick's trying to get Jon to lend him forty dollars," he says, nodding over at the two of them. "He just can't accept that we all know better by this point."

"Never, ever lend your money to Nick," says Danielle gravely. "You will never see it again." Everyone nods. Brendon tries not to meet any of their eyes without actually looking away. Everyone's looking at him. He can tell they're being friendly, but... but it's weird. He doesn't belong here, not really.

"Hey," says the guy sitting directly opposite Brendon, "you're in band, aren't you?" He's a short chubby dude with a mess of curly hair. "Percussion, right?"

"Um, yeah," says Brendon, and then his memory does the weird sparky thing it does whenever music's involved and he thinks – says – "You're brass."

The guy grins. "Tuba! I'm really bad, though. I'd rather play guitar."

"Who wouldn't?" says Brendon. "But still, the _tuba_." He does his tuba impression, oom-pah oom-pah. The guy – Max, Brendon remembers, Jon called him Max – cracks up, and then starts complaining about the music they're doing in band at the moment. Brendon is _always_ up for complaining about the music they're doing in band. He has a whole scheme of bitching which both Jon and Spencer have heard about a million times.

He doesn't notice Jon and Nick come back over, or the way the tension in the room relaxes. Max starts talking about twelve-tone technique and Brendon actually has quite a lot to say about twelve-tone technique, specifically why it's bad and wrong and _evil_. He waves his hands about a lot for emphasis while he says it and kind of elbows Tom in the ear, but he doesn't realize that's what it was until a couple of minutes later when it's probably already too late to apologize. In fact he doesn't look up from his conversation with Max until someone slams the diner door open and roars, "Let's get this party _started_, bitches!"

Brendon jumps and looks up.

There are some crazy people crowding through the doorway.

Their leader is wearing neon. The others are all wearing _some_ neon, wristbands and patches and in the case of one gorgeous, leggy girl who's almost certainly taller than Brendon is, neon green thigh-high boots, but the leader is wearing nothing _but_ neon. He refracts, he reflects, he's positively dazzling; Brendon has to squint to look at him, and not exactly in a good way.

"Gabe!" calls someone from the table, delighted, and then someone else in the doorway shoves the gang of neon people forward and says, "Out of the way, coming through, coming through!" and suddenly there are a whole lot _more_ people. Brendon hears someone yell, "Pete, you fucker!" and someone else calling out longingly to _Victoria, Victoria!_ and Max whispers, "Oh shit, did they seriously bring Bill?", and this is really way too many people and loads of people are standing up and mingling and talking and Brendon's lost sight of Jon. He glances desperately back at Max, who is engaged in some sort of eyebrow communication with his sister – Brendon knows eyebrow communication when he sees it, Brendon is a _master_ of eyebrow communication, but he can't decode Max's – and there is seriously _no one Brendon knows_, and all these newcomers are scary, and then someone sits themselves neatly down next to Brendon and he yelps.

"You're the only person here I don't know," says the newcomer. She's blonde and pretty, wearing a white dress with flowers embroidered around the collar and smiling. She's maybe the least intimidating person Brendon's ever seen. He breathes a sigh of relief, and even manages not to flush and look away when she continues sweetly, "You must be Brendon."

"I – yes," says Brendon.

"Jon's boyfriend?"

"Yes?" says Brendon. For the purposes of this evening he is, anyway.

"Jon kept you pretty secret," says the girl in a considering way. "Why do you suppose that is?"

"I – I don't know," says Brendon. "We – I mean, this whole thing is kind of sudden, you know?" Not a direct lie, but pretty good deflection. The girl smiles at him again and Brendon hasn't the faintest idea what she's thinking.

Thankfully, Max jumps in to rescue him at that point. "Brendon knows his stuff about music," he says. "I didn't realize – how come we haven't talked before, anyway?" he demands in Brendon's direction. "We've both been in band for three years, that's lame."

"It's Jon's fault," says Brendon.

"Yeah, he kept you all for himself," says Max, and laughs.

The blonde girl leans her elbows on the table, still smiling sweetly, and says, "Music? All right, then let's try this one. Five greatest jazz pianists, go."

It sounds almost like a challenge, or a test, but no way is anyone who looks so sweet out to get him. Brendon decides he's just being paranoid and they should all just get back to the music conversation, which was cool. "Okay, first –"

Max and the girl have gotten into an argument over Art Tatum when Brendon becomes aware of someone looking at him. He looks up, unnerved, and then relaxes a little when he realizes it's Jon. Jon's standing on the other side of the room, with some people (Pete? Brendon thinks the short one is Pete) talking to him. He doesn't seem to be listening. He's watching Brendon in a weird way, his eyes distant and almost dazed, with his hands tucked in his pockets like he's been doing it for a while. He's biting down a little bit on one side of his lip. Brendon makes a confused face at him and Jon doesn't seem to notice. It takes him a few seconds to meet Brendon's eyes, startle, and grin at him. He says something to Pete and waves him away as he walks over.

"B, hey," he says, sliding down onto the bench beside Brendon. "You doing okay?" Brendon smiles at him, but before he can answer Jon's hands are sliding around Brendon's waist – Brendon goes stiff with surprise for a second before remembering and forcing himself to relax again – and Jon's tugging him up, saying, "Come and meet Gabanti and people, okay?"

He keeps one hand on Brendon's waist even when they're both standing up again. Brendon's weirdly conscious of it being there the whole time Jon's steering him over to the crowd of new people, even when Jon leans down and whispers in his ear, "Hey, Greta didn't catch you out, did she?"

Brendon's eyes widen. "That was Greta?" he whispers back. He has to stand on tiptoe a little to reach Jon's ear, even though Jon's short. Brendon's shorter. His mom says he'll get another growth spurt if he's patient. "You said she was scary," Brendon murmurs accusingly.

Jon's hand squeezes a little tighter. "She is," he says. "Trust me. She just looks angelic to throw people off the scent." Brendon can't say anything more because Jon's just steered them into the middle of the crowd of new people, and all of them are looking at him.

"Jon Walker, my man!" Brendon gets an impression of neon and leer as they suddenly end up in front of the guy who yelled about getting parties started. "This is your toyboy, is it?"

Brendon freezes. Everyone around him is laughing, and he spots a couple of friendly looks in his direction but mostly they seem like they're waiting for something. If they're waiting for Brendon to be cool they're going to be waiting a long time. "Gabe," says Jon warningly.

Neon Guy – Gabe – steeples his fingers and looks at Brendon over the top of them. "There are important questions to ask you, young one," he intones. "The Cobra has spoken. Not just _anyone_ is permitted to debauch our innocent Jonathan."

"_Gabe_," says Jon again. Brendon wants to look at him for help, but he's not sure he can meet Jon's eyes. His face feels hot.

"So I must ask," Gabe proceeds. "Not out of any puerile curiosity, you understand, but because it is my duty." He grins. His grin is terrifying. Brendon's half-expecting fangs to appear at any moment. "Have you... kissed?" demands Gabe. Jon's hand on Brendon's waist goes light for a second and then squeezes again, like Jon was about to pull away but changed his mind. Brendon's frozen, but Gabe apparently takes his blush for an answer and continues gleefully. "Have you _groped_?" he asks. "Have you rubbed? Have you licked? Have you sucked? Have you fucked him up the ass? Nonsense, look at you, you're obviously a bottom – has he fucked you up the ass?"

Brendon's mouth is hanging open. Everyone seems to be laughing. Gabe has serial killer eyes. Brendon tries to stumble back away from him, but instead he finds himself stumbling into Jon, and then suddenly Jon's arms are both around him and Jon's glaring over Brendon's shoulder – seriously _glaring_ – and saying, "Leave him the fuck alone, Saporta, I mean it."

Gabe looks at Jon, and then looks back at Brendon, and his forehead wrinkles in a frown, and he says, "Nothing personal, young one. Welcome, welcome to our merry fraternity. You have passed your test."

"So you can let go of him now if you want, Jon," says Greta from behind them.

Jon lets go of Brendon quickly, stepping away and rubbing at his face; when Brendon turns to look at him he looks a little red. Greta smiles sweetly at Brendon and says, "You passed the test the instant you didn't run screaming from Gabe."

"Greta!" says Gabe, sounding aggrieved.

"Be quiet, Gabe," says Greta. She still looks sweet and darling but Brendon's sort of starting to see where the scary thing comes from. He wouldn't dare to tell a guy like Gabe to be quiet, but when Greta does it Gabe just gulps and shuts up. Greta puts her hand on Brendon's arm and says, "Where have you been hiding this one, Jon? I like him. Did you know he plays five instruments?"

"Not very well," Brendon protests at once, embarrassed.

Jon gives Greta a funny sort of look and says, "I saw him first." Brendon swallows a laugh.  
_

They leave a couple of hours later. Jon drops Brendon home and Brendon says, "Shit, my parents aren't going to-" and scrabbles his hands through his hair in a futile attempt to get rid of some of the gel.

Jon says, "Won't they like it?"

"It's more that they'll _ask_," says Brendon.

Jon says, "I think you look good." Brendon can't see his face properly, it's dark inside the parked car and the street is a quiet one. His voice is low.

"Yeah?" says Brendon, with forced lightness. It's hard to be casual in that moment, somehow. There's something in his ribcage that's behaving weirdly, all twisty. "Thanks. Well, thank Ryan."

"Who's Ryan?" says Jon quickly.

"Uh, Spencer's Ryan?" says Brendon. Spencer's definitely talked about Ryan in front of Jon before.

"Oh," says Jon. After a pause, he says, "I thought he was imaginary."

"Well, he's pretty unreal," says Brendon.

The car's quiet. Brendon should really get up and leave. He has to go in and face his parents. At least he's not wearing a girl t-shirt anymore; he changed back into his while Jon was driving, twisting around in the passenger seat.

"I guess I'll see you tomorrow?" Jon says. He looks up, and the headlights of a passing car illuminate his face with a long slow slide of light, brightening and dimming. The rest of him is a solid dark shape in the driver's seat. Brendon thinks out of nowhere of Gabe leering and saying _have you kissed?_ The coiling feeling in his chest is maybe something like embarrassment.

"Yeah, see you tomorrow," he says, jumping quickly out of the car and snatching his bag up after him. "Thanks, by the way. I had fun."

"Me too," says Jon. "Thanks for coming, B."

Brendon endures the interrogation from his mom as best he can. She doesn't comment on the hair gel or the new expensive jeans, which surprises him until he realizes she's just too happy that Brendon actually seems to be having a social life at school to care. She wants to know who he was with, and if he had fun, and what they were all like, and Brendon ends up giving her a weird mish-mash of his day with Ryan and Spencer – _not_ mentioning the whole cutting-school thing – and the diner. He leaves out Gabe and his cohorts entirely; what moms don't know won't hurt them, and Brendon doesn't even need to think about it to know his mom wouldn't like the idea of Gabe.

She seems to like the idea of Jon, though. When Brendon mentions Jon dropped him off, she says, "Oh, he's the senior from band, isn't he? I'm so glad you're still friends. I did worry that – well, never mind."

Brendon wants to feel resentful that his mom's so dubious about his friend-making and friend-keeping abilities, but the evidence is all on her side.

When he goes to bed he leaves all his clothes on the floor even though he knows he'll get yelled at for that if any of his family notices. He thinks he'll go to sleep at once, but instead he lies awake for a long time, staring at the glow-in-the-dark stars on his bedroom ceiling. His mind keeps circling back to Jon's hand, warm on his waist.  
_

Being Jon's fake boyfriend, Brendon discovers over the next couple of weeks, is actually pretty awesome.

After school, suddenly, his life is full of things to do. If it isn't the diner then it's hanging out with Ryan and Spencer at Spencer's house, and then Brendon starts getting invited along to _other_ things – movie nights and parties and tiny shows played by the band that some of Jon's friends are in – and maybe he can't go to all of them, but people still want him there. One time _Jon_ can't go and Greta still gets hold of his number and texts him and says he has to come anyway. Brendon can't really remember ever feeling so _liked_ before, and it's pretty amazing.

Ryan has Brendon's number too, now, and it turns out he's a compulsive texter. Brendon takes to keeping his phone switched off in class, which he's never ever needed to do before – no one ever texted him during the day before. Now it's not just Ryan (whose texts never make much sense, but Brendon appreciates them anyway) but Jon too. Jon keeps texting Brendon pictures taken with his phone's camera – a nutshell on the sidewalk, the pattern of reflections in a broken window pane, his own bare toes in flip-flops – which make Brendon smile. His own phone's camera is shit and he's a bad photographer anyway, so he replies with random chatter about what he's doing instead. A picture of a confused-looking cat with its head on one side gets **my math desk has flwrs carvd on it** while a broken, rusted-up fire escape gets **listnd 2 the beetles last nite – let it be let it be let it be.**

He has people to sit with at lunch now as well – in fact, he has _multiple groups_ of people to sit with at lunch now, because there's Jon's friends and there's also Max's friends, who are mostly in Brendon's year. Mostly, of course, Brendon ends up sitting with Jon – sitting next to him. He stops even noticing when Jon leans into him, presses their thighs together – well, that's not true, Brendon still _notices_, but it starts to feel natural. He just leans back. Once, feeling daring, he kisses Jon's cheek, and smirks at Jon's silent surprise. Brendon's pretty good at this fake boyfriend thing.

No one knows about the trick except Ryan and Spencer, and Spencer keeps it quiet and Ryan doesn't even go to their school. Everyone seems to be fooled. Brendon even catches some people giving him envious looks in the corridors as the news gets around, and he doesn't know whether to feel weird about it or not. He'd be the first to admit that he's got to look pretty enviable right now, because, well, _Jon_. If Brendon's pretty good at the fake boyfriend thing then Jon's kind of amazing. Jon -

"Yeah, we get it, you have the biggest crush of all time on Jon Walker's smile and his jokes and his triangle playing and his flip-flops," says Spencer, sounding bored.

"What?" says Brendon, offended. "I was just explaining how Jon's really good at being a fake boyfriend."

"No, it's quite all right, Brendon," says Ryan. "Tell us again how he walks you to class and leaves notes in your locker and buys you pretty things and lets you eat off his plate."

Brendon opens his mouth to protest. It's not like the notes Jon leaves in his locker say actual boyfriendly kinds of things. They tend to be more about smiley faces and 'see you tonight' and –

"And also how it makes sense that everyone's jealous of you because he's so hot," Spencer adds. "You can talk about his shoulders for a bit if you like. Or his hands. Or that thing his eyes do when he smiles. We don't mind at all."

"No, we haven't heard it a million times before or anything," says Ryan. "It's not like you talk about him _all_ the time."

"Remember the day before yesterday?" says Spencer nostalgically. "We had a conversation that wasn't about Jon at all. What was it about, Ryan?"

"I've forgotten," says Ryan mournfully. "My memory has retroactively imposed a layer of Jon Walker over every conversation we've had for the last two weeks. It's like even when he's not mentioned he's still hovering there at the edge of my consciousness. I can see his reflection in Brendon's starry eyes."

"My eyes are not starry!" says Brendon.

His phone beeps. He jumps and scrambles for it.

"Better get that," says Ryan with an amused tilt to his mouth as Brendon flips it open. "It might be Jon."  
_

Brendon _doesn't_ have a crush on Jon.

Not that Jon's not completely crush-worthy and awesome, just, Brendon's not actually crushing on him. That would be weird and – well, not wrong, obviously, Jon as good as said that he crushes on boys sometimes, Brendon doesn't think it's wrong – but it would be weird. Jon is Jon. Jon's Brendon's _friend_, and Brendon's not the kind of person who'd let this whole thing they're doing make him get _confused_ or whatever. That would be not just weird but also pretty dumb.

He keeps telling himself this.

There are ten days left till prom and it's starting to sound less and less convincing.  
_

"Tonight's the night," whispers Jon, leaning over Brendon's shoulder when Brendon's eating. They've claimed one end of the table for themselves, no one's listening. "You ready for this, B?"

Brendon swallows his bite of sandwich and grins up at Jon. "As I'll ever be," he says. "I don't know, it's working pretty well so far, isn't it?"

Jon sits down beside him. "Yeah," he says. "It's good." He rubs the back of his neck and offers Brendon a smile. "Thanks," he says. "Did I say? Thanks, thanks for doing this."

"It's no problem," says Brendon. "I mean, I – I like being with you." Shit, that sounds weird. "And, like, your friends," he corrects himself at once. "And, I don't know, Ryan's having the time of his life. When I asked him to sort out my clothes for tonight I think he died a little bit from joy. I have seriously no idea what he's planning, I just hope it's not too weird, you know?"

"Yeah," says Jon. He puts both his hands in his own hair for a moment, running his fingers through it, and then seems to realize what he's doing and stops abruptly, leaning his elbows on the table instead and propping his chin on his hand. He looks at Brendon, but then looks away again before he says abruptly, "Can I ask – are you and Ryan... or, I don't know, maybe you and Spencer..." he trails off.

_What?_ thinks Brendon, and he says it too, "What?"

Jon shakes his head. "Never mind, weird question. Not really my business, right?"

Brendon narrows his eyes, thinking, and then says, "Wait, are you asking – Jon!"

Jon ducks his head. "Sorry? I shouldn't have asked."

"But I'm – I'm not, I mean, I'm –" _straight_, Brendon nearly says, but he's looking at the line of Jon's throat as his mouth opens around the word and wow, is it ever not true. Self-delusion only goes so far.

"- not that kind of guy," he finishes instead. "I'll have you know that I only ever have one fake boyfriend at a time, Mister Walker." He waggles his eyebrows. Jon looks up at him through his eyelashes and laughs a soft, amused laugh. Brendon gets distracted for a moment by the way the angles of the electric lights overhead throw Jon's cheekbones into sharp relief and paint a soft, inviting shadow right below his lower lip.

"Tonight, then," says Jon. "I'll pick you up from...?"

"Spencer's," says Brendon firmly. Then he confesses, "My parents kind of think I'm sleeping over there. They don't know about... well, I mean, they're pretty conservative, so. We kind of told Spencer's mom this whole long sob story to make her say it was okay?"

(That had been Ryan's idea; he said Spencer's mom was really soft-hearted and Spencer snorted and said, "You'd know." All Brendon had had to do was stand there looking glum and staring at the happy and sad faces on his sneakers while Ryan started to spin a tale of Tragic Love Cruelly Denied and, amazingly, it had worked.)

"I'll see you there, then," says Jon, just as the bell rings for the end of lunch. His hand brushes the back of Brendon's neck as he leaves, right at the hairline. It's probably an accident. Brendon ducks his head and swallows the last of his sandwich, reaching for his bag. So he's maybe sort of attracted to Jon, he tells himself as he gets up to leave. Just a little bit. That's not the same thing as a _crush_.  
_

"Shower," says Ryan, the instant Brendon gets in the door.

From the kitchen, Spencer's mom calls, "Is that Brendon? Hi, Brendon!" but Ryan doesn't even give Brendon a chance to answer, just takes his arm and frogmarches him up the stairs. If you'd asked Brendon before now, he would have said that no way was skinny Ryan Ross strong enough to make anyone go anywhere, but apparently the skinniness is just a cover for his implacable robot strength or something, because Brendon really doesn't have much choice. Ryan shoves him into the bathroom, throws a towel in after him, and shouts, "Rinse twice, and use conditioner!"

It's like Ryan's leveled up into super-Ryan, Brendon thinks. Now ten times crazier and starting a personal hygiene dictatorship. He gets in the shower.

When he wanders down the hall to Spencer's room half an hour or so later with his hair still wet and dripping, wearing nothing but his boxers and the towel around his shoulders, he hears some giggling coming from one of the bedrooms. He looks around but there's no one there. When he goes into Spencer's room he says, "Do you have a giggling ghost or something?"

"Probably my sisters," says Spencer without looking up from the videogame he's playing, and then he does look up and does a double-take. "Oh my god, please tell me you weren't prancing around naked in front of my little sisters. I will end you."

"I'm not naked!" says Brendon. "I'm wearing boxers!"

Spencer does not look appeased. Brendon considers trying to hide behind Ryan. It probably wouldn't work. Even super-Ryan isn't going to be a match for angry Spencer.

"Everyone shut up and settle down," says Ryan, appearing out of nowhere – or, okay, out of Spencer's closet, and carrying a bundle of fabric over his arm. "I have art to create." He says it in a serious way, pronouncing all the capital letters: I have Art to Create. Spencer rolls his eyes but settles for giving Brendon a dangerous glare rather than actually ending him.

Brendon says, "You know he's not even picking me up until eight, right?"

Ryan says, "I know." He looks worried. "We've barely got any time at all."  
_

What feels like a million years later, Ryan says, "Okay, yeah, I'm happy with that."

"Where do you even get all these clothes?" Brendon groans.

Ryan smirks and taps the side of his nose. Then he says, "Right, hold still, I'm doing your hair."  
_

"Please tell me you're done," says Brendon.

"I'm afraid he can't do that, Dave," says Spencer in his best computer-voice. He's still playing videogames. It's like he doesn't care about Brendon's plight at all.

Ryan gets out his hairspray and starts spraying it everywhere. Brendon coughs. Spencer says, "Great, now my room's going to smell like that shit for days."  
_

"Oh no," says Brendon. "No way."

"But –" says Ryan.

"No!" says Brendon. "No makeup!"

Ryan crouches down on the rug in front of Brendon and looks up at him through his eyelashes. He makes a sad face.

"Pouting isn't going to help!" says Brendon. Brendon is wise to the ways of the pout, okay, no one does pouting better than Brendon.  
_

"Are you seriously still not done?" says Spencer.

"Yeah, are you seriously still not done?" Brendon echoes him.

"If you'd just stop fucking _blinking_ when I'm trying to do your eyeliner..." says Ryan.  
_

Ryan steps back and puts his hands on his hips. "I am a genius," he announces. "I am a god. I am an _artist._"

"You –" says Spencer, and then he turns and actually looks at Brendon. His eyebrows go up. "Huh," he says. "Not bad."

"Thank you," says Ryan with dry modesty. "I try."

Brendon jiggles his leg. His shiny shoes go tap-tap-tap against the floor. He's halfway between nervous and excited. "I want to see," he demands. "Can I see yet?"

"Yes, come on," says Ryan, and pulls him up and across the corridor to the mirror in Spencer's parents' room. "Ta-da!" he says proudly.

Brendon looks at himself in the mirror. He folds his arms, cocks his hip, tilts his head a little to the side, and starts to grin. He turns to give Ryan a semi-incredulous look.

"I know, right?" says Ryan, hopping from foot to foot with self-satisfaction.

Brendon looks back at the mirror. The guy there is undeniably gorgeous, dark-eyed and slim and looking completely at home in his sharply-cut formal suit. Ryan's put a red sash thing around his waist, the same color as his bow tie, and it shouldn't work but it really kind of does. Brendon says, "_Thank_ you."

Ryan wraps his arms around Brendon's shoulders in a hug and whispers, "Good luck, okay? Go get him," in his ear. Brendon doesn't try to argue – doesn't answer at all – but he keeps his arms folded and hugs himself a little as Ryan turns to Spencer, who's hovering in the doorway, and declares, "Okay, fucker, I was promised pizza for this."  
_

Jon shows up a little early, when Brendon and Ryan and Spencer are all still in Spencer's front room eating pizza. Ryan eats pizza twice as fast as everyone else. Spencer's little sisters keep peeking in through the door and giggling in Brendon's general direction, which is _weird_. "They _like_ you," says Spencer, sing-song and mocking, and they all laugh. The twins squeak and disappear.

Brendon's definitely never been a crush object for eleven-year-olds before. He's not sure how he feels about it.

They all miss the doorbell ringing while they're laughing, and it takes Spencer's mom coming in and saying, "Brendon, someone here for you," with a wide smile for Brendon to realize. He bounces to his feet and says, "Jon!" just as Jon peers over Mrs Smith's shoulder.

"Hi?" says Jon. He's wearing a tux and his hair has been combed, which is hilarious, because Jon's hair is never combed. He's also wearing actual _shoes_, which is pretty unusual for him. Brendon was half-expecting him to show up to prom in flip-flops. He smirks a little at the mental image, and then smirks some more when Jon scratches nervously at the side of one shoe with the toe of the other. He really obviously doesn't like them.

Brendon grins at him. "Come in and have some pizza," he suggests.

Ryan, who's just reached out for the last slice of pizza, looks up guiltily but doesn't actually stop. Spencer and Brendon and Mrs Smith all say "_Ryan!_" just as he takes a bite, and Ryan swallows and says, "What?" defiantly, and then, "It was _my_ pizza."

Jon laughs. "That's okay," he says. "We've kind of got to go anyway." He meets Brendon's eyes. "Looking good, B," he says, a little quieter. Brendon swallows. Jon's got his hands behind his back as he says, "I got you something," and smiles lopsidedly.

"What?" says Brendon, instantly fascinated.

Jon brings his hands out from behind his back. He's holding a red rosebud on a single long stem. "We said, right, you're a roses kind of guy... right?" he says. "So, um, here. Rose."

Brendon's got a kind of shiny bubble expanding in his chest, that's the only way he can think of to describe it, how he feels. He takes three long steps across the room to Jon and holds out his hand, and Jon drops the rosebud into it and then leaves his hand there for a long minute, their two hands almost-clasped around it. Brendon tries to tell himself his breath doesn't catch. "Thanks," he nearly whispers.

"Give it here," says Ryan imperiously from right beside him.

Brendon jumps. He'd forgotten there were other people in the room.

Ryan snatches the flower away from them both, mutters something incomprehensible under his breath, and starts fixing it carefully in Brendon's buttonhole. "Do _not_ fiddle with it," he commands Brendon. "You'll kill it. And don't fiddle with your cufflinks either, they're mine and I don't want you losing them."

"Uh, you must be Ryan," says Jon. He raises his hand in a little wave. "Good to see you too, Spence."

"Don't mind Ryan," says Spencer dryly. "He's got strong feelings about accessories."

"He's always been like that," says Spencer's mom fondly, which makes Ryan go red and stop adjusting the rosebud in favor of trying to hide behind his bangs. "Are you ready to go, boys?"

"Thank you for having me, Mrs Smith," Brendon remembers to say politely. He got his guest manners hammered into him early on.

"Now, you're coming back here afterwards, aren't you?" says Mrs Smith. "We'll all be in bed, but Spence and Ryan will wait up for you, won't you, boys?" Spencer and Ryan mumble something affirmative. Spencer's mom is the only person in the world capable of reducing Spencer to mumbling, Brendon's discovered.

"I promise I'll drop him back in one piece," says Jon. "We'd really better –"

"Wait, wait!" says Mrs Smith. "Not just yet, I want photographs."

She shoos them out into the hallway and fetches her camera, and Brendon feels a little embarrassed while she makes him and Jon pose on the stairs. Of course, she doesn't _know_ it's not real – Ryan's whole story to get her to go along with this had kind of been based on Brendon and Jon being tragic high-school sweethearts – but it _isn't_ real. Jon couldn't have been expecting to do the whole couple photographs thing, and Mrs Smith is obviously determined to make up whatever shortcomings she thinks Brendon's parents have, and it ought to be seriously, seriously awkward.

It's not, though. Jon just smiles his usual easy smile and pulls Brendon closer to him, resting his chin on Brendon's shoulder, and if Brendon shivers a little Jon doesn't seem to notice it. Brendon wraps their hands together, twining their fingers, and tries not to notice Ryan and Spencer making meaningful smirky faces at each other behind Mrs Smith. Ryan and Spencer are shitty friends (well, no they're not, Brendon can't make himself claim it even in his own head) who need to stay out of Brendon's business and stop trying to make out that he's got a crush when he hasn't, he _hasn't_.

"I think we should have some photos with Ryan and Spencer too," he says loudly, and Mrs Smith is enchanted by the idea and forces them all to crowd together by the door with their arms over each other's shoulders. Spencer does his very best to slouch rebelliously, and Ryan is apparently incapable of smiling in photographs unless you take him by surprise, but Brendon cheerfully makes bunny ears behind both their heads while Jon giggles. Brendon doesn't think Jon noticed the meaningful smirky faces Ryan and Spencer were making. He hopes not. It would be the worst thing in the world if Jon realized that Brendon's being weird and got all uncomfortable.

When they finally manage to escape they're actually running kind of late. "Doesn't matter," says Jon. "No one else is going to get there on time anyway." He smiles. His hand brushes Brendon's as they fumble with their seatbelts in the car.


	3. Chapter 3

There's already a long line for the professional photographer the school's hired, and Brendon thinks they're going to skip it, but Jon drags him into the line. "It's prom!" he says when Brendon tries to protest. "I'm only going to get to go to one senior prom, B, you're not trying to deny me my photos, are you?" He makes an exaggerated sad face.

Brendon says, "You could always come to mine next year," without thinking. He feels strange about it as soon as he's said it. It's just a joke, obviously, but – but –

But Jon hooks his arm through Brendon's and says, "I'd like that. I could have _two_ sets of crappy couple photos with generic backgrounds." He's smiling down at Brendon. His eyes are sparkling a little bit. "It'd be awesome."

"Maybe we could keep it up," Brendon suggests. "We could just keep crashing the senior prom, every single year, until you have enough pictures that you can paper your bedroom with them or something."

Jon laughs. "That's what I want," he says. "Millions of them. Until we're old and grey, with beards and canes, and the photographers finally notice something suspicious."

"I bet I could rock a cane," says Brendon thoughtfully.

"You totally could," Jon agrees.

Someone snickers behind them. Brendon turns around and Greta's there looking adorable and retro in a flapper dress. "You don't even go to this school," says Brendon accusingly. Then his eyes land on her date. Gabe apparently doesn't think formal wear is a reason to give up on his neon theme. "You're a college student!" says Brendon.

"Ah, grasshopper," says Gabe kindly, "when it comes to crashing proms, you have a lot to learn."

"You two are so cute it's kind of sickening," says Greta. "I'm not entirely sure I like it. Look, Gabe, he's _blushing_."

Brendon blinks. He doesn't _think_ he's blushing. He's kind of used to Gabe and Greta by now (and that's a weird thought, who in the world could get used to that combination?) It takes him a moment to realize that they're not looking at him. Beside him, Jon's ducked his head and is shuffling his feet a little.

"That's darling," says Greta. "You know, Jon, I think it's about time you–"

Greta is scary and Jon needs rescuing. Brendon jumps into the conversation with, "So, um, what are we doing afterwards?"

Gabe's grin goes positively demonic. "Well, I'm surprised you two haven't got plans already," he says, leering. "But if you find yourselves finished with undue speed – no shame, no shame, you're young, it happens – there's an afterparty at Pete's."

Brendon's definitely the one blushing now. Jon makes a little choking noise. "Gabe," says Greta primly.

"My own angel and I will of course be absent," says Gabe, "as we are planning to devote our night to the experience of, how shall I put this, a veritable _feast_ of carnal delights –"

Greta swats him with her handbag. "We'll see you at Pete's," she says.

Thankfully at that moment the photographer calls them through to get their picture taken. Jon looks, if anything, even happier to have escaped than Brendon feels. "Wow," Brendon whispers to him.

"I know," says Jon ruefully. "We should never have let them meet in the first place."

"How come the party's at Pete's?" Brendon says. "Isn't Pete a college student too?"

Jon thinks about this. "Yes," he says, "but he does like sleeping with highschoolers."  
_

The photograph is a blur of posing and giggling and Jon staring with happy fascination at the professional photographer's big boxy camera on its tripod, and then they're in the school hall and there's music playing. Brendon's smile feels huge. "Dancing time!" he announces. There is nothing in the world Brendon loves more than a cast-iron _excuse_ to make an idiot of himself in public, just so long as it's his idea. The music is the worst kind of cheesy – the _best_ kind of cheesy – and Brendon barely waits long enough to swallow a plastic cupful of vaguely weird-tasting punch before he's dragging Jon onto the floor.

(Jon takes one sip of the punch, makes a startled face, and says very, very regretfully, "I've got to drive, though." He sticks to water for the rest of the evening.)

And then they dance. Brendon doesn't just dance with Jon: he dances with Tom and Danielle and Sean and Al and one of Al's dates (the other two won't let go of him) and a couple of girls he's never seen in his life before and even with gorgeous Meg, who blinks at him in a slow confused way afterwards and says, "Do I know you?" He dances with Gabe and Greta, which leaves him feeling vaguely dirty and wondering whether he's going to get told off by the tired-looking teachers standing in the corners for being obscene in a public place. He does three backflips in a row in the middle of _It's Gonna Be Me_ (who the hell picked the playlist for this evening?) and the whole room cheers. Brendon's never had so much fun in his whole life. He drinks another cup of the spiked punch, and thinks that maybe his parents got the whole alcohol thing a little bit wrong. Brendon doesn't feel like he's about to go off the rails or lose control or ruin anyone's life. Brendon feels just _fine_, thank you. Every time he looks round Jon's laughing, or catching his hand and pulling him in, and Brendon pants and leans against him and kind of yells in his ear, "Thank you for inviting me!" more than once. It needs to be _said_ more than once. Jon is fucking wonderful. Brendon tugs him back out onto the dance floor and makes him do the Macarena.

At one point Nick wanders over to Brendon and tries to borrow twenty dollars, and Brendon's so happy he gives it to him. Jon bursts out laughing and Brendon just gives him an arch look. "Everyone should be having as good a night as I am," he declares, leaning back against the table.

"I don't think anyone's having as good a night as you are, B," says Jon, and he puts his hands on the table on either side of Brendon and leans in to kiss him on the cheek. Brendon giggles and wonders who's watching. "Except maybe me," Jon says, close enough that Brendon can still feel his breath puff out against Brendon's cheek. He shivers a little bit and looks up at Jon through his eyelashes and can't remember why it was he wasn't supposed to let himself do either of those things.

Jon swallows. Brendon watches his throat move. Somewhere in the room, Gabe yells, "Robot dance!"

"Oh my god, _robot dance_," says Brendon ecstatically, and makes Jon come and do it with him. Jon's face is flushed and his hair is not looking all that combed anymore. For the rest of the night Brendon keeps finding himself watching him as he hilariously attempts to avoid Greta or declares a random thumb war with Tom. No one calls him on it. The people he dances with just keep giving him indulgent looks, and Brendon dances every other dance with Jon anyway.

Sometime after eleven the impossibly lame DJ – who Brendon actually thinks is their math teacher in a wig – picks up his microphone and says, "Okay, folks, and this one's for all the lovers in the room."

Brendon's actually leaning against the wall with Sean and Ryan J, taking a break. He's decided that now maybe is the time to lay off the spiked punch – or, well, Ryan J had given him a look and said, "Brendon, you don't know what's in that shit!" – and he's sipping a plastic cup full of water instead. He sort of wishes the water were colder – he's kind of sweaty and gross, his hair is sticking to his forehead, and he's gonna have to wash Ryan's clothes somehow before he gives them back – but he's breathless and happy just the same. This was a fucking awesome idea. Their math-teacher-DJ puts on another track, and some warbling clarinets start to play, and Brendon says, "Oh god, Celine Dion? Really?"

He's overjoyed. If Brendon himself had set out to make the cheesiest prom playlist in the world, he could not have done it better.

And then Jon appears in front of him, shaking his hair out of his face, and Brendon remembers _oh, right_. He's here as Jon's fake date. That means that they probably kind of have to do the slow dance. Jon says, "Brendon?" He sounds kind of tentative.

Brendon smiles at him and holds out his hands. "Let's do it."

Jon leads him out into the middle of all the suddenly-very-romantic couples on the dance floor. Brendon catches sight of Tom and Danielle, and even Gabe and Greta, though their slow dance seems to involve more grinding than Brendon really associates with the whole concept.

Not that he'd know, he thinks. Brendon's never slow danced with anyone before. He puts his hands nervously on Jon's shoulders and Jon smiles down at him crookedly and wraps his arms around Brendon's waist, and they just kind of sway on the spot in time with the music. It's - it's pretty nice, actually, and when Brendon looks around lots of couples are kissing. Maybe they should be too. If they were really boyfriends they'd probably be kissing.

He turns back to Jon and leans in to whisper this to him, but - maybe Jon takes the leaning the wrong way or something, and halfway through the lean when he realizes Jon's coming closer too Brendon thinks wait, no, maybe it's the right way. Maybe this _is_ what he wants. He wants to get his first kiss under the disco ball hanging in the school hall with the lights down low and Celine Dion playing. That is exactly how lame Brendon is, and he doesn't even care, because he wants his first kiss to be _Jon_. He can admit that now, he has to admit that now, because this is the only chance he's ever going to get.

His hands tighten on Jon's shoulders as one of Jon's hands comes up to the back of Brendon's head to hold him steady and Jon's mouth ever-so-softly touches his. Kissing is weird, Brendon thinks almost at once, but he doesn't move away, and they're still swaying together to the music, and after a minute Jon breaks the kiss for just a second, licks his lips and comes back in, and Brendon corrects himself mentally with _kissing is amazing_. Jon is amazing. Jon is hot and funny and kind and actually seems to like Brendon, and none of this is real, not the prom photos or the dancing or the kiss, and none of this is fair, but Brendon closes his eyes and puts his hand on the side of Jon's face to steady him and lets himself feel, just for a minute, the way Jon's lips are soft and his shaved cheeks are a little bit rough.

The next time Jon pulls away Brendon grins at him carefully and says, "So, bet we've got them all fooled, right?"

Jon's hand does a weird little movement where it's still resting on Brendon's back, but he says, "Yup. Completely bamboozled," and grins back.

The song is nearly over. Brendon leans forward and rests his forehead on Jon's shoulder and tries to enjoy himself for a little bit longer. The hand Jon had in Brendon's hair drops down, rests on his neck for a second, and then goes back to his waist. Brendon doesn't even try to tell himself he doesn't miss it.  
_

Jon drives them to Pete's. Brendon doesn't call shotgun, but he doesn't need to, because Tom and Sean and Danielle all pile giggling into the backseat before he gets the chance to say anything. One of the straps of Danielle's dress is slipping down her arm, and Sean seems to have lost his jacket since the last time Brendon saw him, just before the slow dance. He exchanges a glance with Jon, who bites his lip and shrugs.

"I can't stay that late," Brendon murmurs to Jon as he starts the car, tapping his fingers against his leg. "Ryan and Spencer are waiting up for me." He doesn't need to keep his voice down, really. There is distinct impression of Not Paying Attention drifting from the backseat. Jon just says, "Okay," without meeting Brendon's eyes, and pulls out of the parking lot. They're following Gabe's purple van, the one with the spray-painted snakes all over it.

The journey is very quiet. Brendon thinks about flipping the radio on – he's been in Jon's car often enough by now that he knows how to work it and everything – but he feels too awkward to do it. There are muffled giggles drifting from the backseat, and faint, wet sounds that Brendon tries desperately not to connect with any mental images. Halfway through the drive Jon raises his voice a little and says, "Tom, man, I do love you, but if you try to have a threesome in the back seat of my car I will have to kill you."

There's a few seconds of immensely guilty silence. Brendon glances in the rear-view mirror, driven by overwhelming curiosity, and then sincerely wishes he hadn't.

Tom says, "We wouldn't do that, JWalk."

Jon says nothing, but it's a meaningful kind of nothing.

"No, man, I understand," says Tom. "We know you've got plans for this backseat."

Danielle snorts and Sean lets out a giggle, and Brendon's face is burning, it is, and Jon just snaps, "Shut the fuck up, Tom." Brendon bites his lip and tries to force the sudden flood of mental images away. He and Jon _aren't_ going to be making out in the backseat of Jon's car, they never were, so he's got no excuse for thinking about it. He hasn't got any right to be sitting next to Jon right now and thinking about peeling his jacket off his shoulders, trying to push it away in the cramped space, crawling on top of Jon and kissing him again, and again and again, until they're both breathless. Brendon certainly hasn't ever thought about it before (Ryan and Spencer make skeptical faces inside his head), and even if he had, well –

It doesn't help that he knows, now, what it feels like to have Jon's mouth on his. It doesn't help that he knows Jon's lips would be warm and chapped and a little bit slick where he's licked them, that it would feel weird and hot and close, that Jon's hands would maybe, maybe, be carding through Brendon's hair –

"Okay, guys, everyone out," says Jon, steering the car into a parking space a little way down the street from where Gabe's purple van is already open, spilling a ridiculous number of people out onto the sidewalk. "The threesome express has arrived, you guys can go find a room now."

Tom and Sean and Danielle don't even try to pretend that's not exactly what they're going to do. Brendon feels the year's age difference between all of them and him more sharply than he has since that first not-date in the diner. Everyone around him seems adult and experienced and knowing, and he didn't even know that the funny taste in the punch meant it was spiked until Jon said so. Danielle's arm is reaching right across Tom's back so she can tuck her hand in the back of Sean's waistband. The three of them stumble together towards the apartment building where everyone else is milling around the entrance, and Brendon looks down and hooks his thumbs through the stupid red sash thing Ryan made him wear. Earlier he felt like he was hot in it; now he just feels weird.

"You okay, B?" says Jon beside him. His voice is quiet.

"I can't stay long," Brendon repeats.

"No problem," says Jon. "Just tell me when you want to go. Come on."

He knocks his shoulder against Brendon's but doesn't actually touch him as they walk up to Pete's apartment together in the middle of the mingled crowd of highschoolers and random college friends of Gabe's and Pete's. A part of Brendon was expecting to be holding hands, or even half-hugging; it's what they've been doing all along. It wasn't _real_, he reminds himself. And now prom is over and Jon can get on with his real life. Jon doesn't need a fake boyfriend anymore.

Pete's apartment is hot and too crowded and there's music but Brendon can't really hear it over the sounds of people talking at each other. People are drinking shots and howling dares at each other and one of the guys Pete lives with has brought out some weed and is passing it around. There are couples making out on every couch, even a couple of people Brendon's never seen in his life before squashed together on top of a beanbag and sucking face enthusiastically. Gabe has found a coffee table and claimed it for his own; he's standing on top of it, grinding enthusiastically against a tall, skinny guy with hair like a bird's nest. Greta's vanished completely. Pete is presiding over the whole thing with a manic, horsy grin, obviously having the time of his life. He's the only person who bothers to greet Brendon, bounding up to him and grabbing both his hands. "You made it, Urie, fucking awesome!" he yells over the noise. "Good to see you! Say, do you know who that guy is?"

"Which guy?" says Brendon.

"The _argyle_ guy," says Pete, pointing. "Him. I love him. I think he's my soulmate. Who is he?"

Brendon squints. "You mean Patrick?" he hazards. He sort of knows Patrick. Patrick's in band, playing variously trumpet, trombone, drums and oboe depending on who the teacher thinks is most hopeless this week. He had absolutely no idea Patrick was going to be at this party.

"_Patrick_," breathes Pete, and he hugs Brendon round the shoulders. "You're my hero. Have some tequila. It'll rock your innocent schoolboy world. I must away!"

"Did he just say 'I must away'?" Brendon asks plaintively, but no one answers. No one's paying any attention to him. Jon's already over at the makeshift bar, negotiating with the guy running it for a coke _without_ the rum. Brendon hears him say, "I know, I know, right, it's me, but I've got to drive," and doesn't listen for any more. He could easily get some tequila like Pete suggested – it's pretty obvious that almost everyone here is underage, and the drink is still flowing pretty damn freely – but for the first time all evening the guilty specter of his mother's disapproving face rises in his conscience. She would maybe understand about the prom, if Brendon told her, and about the last couple of weeks, and maybe even about the fake boyfriends thing... but she wouldn't understand this. She wouldn't understand Brendon _lying_ to her about this.

He makes his way across the room, elbowing past complete strangers who ignore him completely – he sort of recognizes Bill, but the others are a mystery – and reaches a door. He pushes it open, peers round it, sees Danielle's pretty blue prom dress puddled on the floor, and quickly slams it closed again before he has to see any more. Oh god. He tries a different door, and thank god, it's a bathroom. No one's in it. Brendon just needs to hide for a minute.

He doesn't belong here. He's spoiling Jon's evening just by being here, stopping him from joining in the drinking and the partying and the making out on couches. A little stab of something miserable goes through Brendon at the thought of Jon making out with someone else on one of those couches, and shit. Shit. This wasn't supposed to happen, he wasn't _supposed_ to end up crushing on Jon like a complete idiot, why does Brendon always, always mess things up?

He needs to get out of here.

He takes another couple of seconds just to breathe, and to check his reflection in the tiny, stained bathroom mirror. The hot-Brendon guy that Ryan created is still there, weirdly – Brendon feels like he ought to have vanished – but he's not as there. The eyeliner all seems to have gone. The worried expression spoils the illusion even more. Brendon makes a face at himself in the mirror – man _up_, Urie – and jumps when someone pounds loudly on the locked door, rattling at the handle. He unlocks the door, lets the guy who was knocking get past (Brendon thinks it's a guy, anyway, all he really sees of him is a tangle of long dirty hair), and goes to find Jon.

"Hey," he says, finally fighting his way through the crowd to Jon's side. Jon is laughing and joking with two gorgeous girls, one blonde, one redhead, more people Brendon's never seen in his life before – _college girls_, he thinks, just as he interrupts, and feels worse about it. "Hey," he says again. "Sorry. Is it okay if – can I go home?"

"What? Are you sure?" says Jon, looking round, and then when he meets Brendon's eyes, "Hey, hey, yeah, of course, no problem. I'll drop you back. Bye Jess, bye Ashlee," he says to the college girls. Brendon gives them a kind of little wave as they leave. The blonde one ignores it, but the redhead waves back, looking sympathetic. Brendon feels worse.

"Are you sure?" Jon says again to Brendon as they cross the room. "Don't you want – you can stay, you're welcome to stay." There's a weird note in his voice, Brendon can't quite make it out. It's probably just because the room is so loud.

"No, it's okay," Brendon says. "I've got to go anyway, you know? Thanks for inviting me, though."

"I – no, thanks for coming," says Jon. They get through the door just as he finishes saying it, and the last syllable hangs forlorn and confused in the empty corridor outside, _ing ing ing_. Brendon almost giggles at it, even though it's not funny and he really doesn't feel like laughing at all.

Jon makes a little cut-off movement, like he was going to reach out and take Brendon's hand but then remembered that no one was watching them anymore. It's over, the whole thing's over. Brendon crosses his arms in front of himself and shifts his weight from foot to foot. Jon says, "I guess we'd better go, then."

"Sorry," says Brendon again, in case that helps. It doesn't seem to.  
_

Jon drives him back to Spencer's house in near-silence. Brendon tries switching the radio on but the late-night announcer's voice blares so loud and startling that he immediately turns it off again.

When the car stops outside Spencer's driveway there's still a light on in Spencer's room. It's two in the morning. Brendon feels a little relieved to think there are people waiting for him, people who won't be leering or yelling or drinking or grinding against other people on coffee tables or making out on couches or having threesomes or flirting with college girls. "Well," he says, "this is me, I guess."

"Yeah," says Jon. Brendon glances over at him, but he can't make out Jon's expression. It's too dark.

"Thanks," says Brendon. "I had a good time."

"I'm glad," says Jon. "Me too." He hesitates. "I'll try to get your twenty back from Nick for you."

Brendon laughs. "No point. I know _that_."

"Yeah," says Jon. "Yeah, okay."

"Are you going back to the party now?" Brendon asks.

"I don't know," says Jon. "I guess."

"Go on. Go back, have fun," Brendon dictates, more cheerfully than he feels. "You only get to do senior prom once, right?"

"Right," says Jon. There's an awkward pause. Jon says, "You'll be okay?"

"Ryan and Spencer are still up," says Brendon, pointing.

"Okay," says Jon.

The car's quiet for a minute.

"Well, goodnight," says Brendon at last, and reaches for the door handle.

"Goodnight, B," says Jon. He sounds kind of subdued.  
_

"Well?" says Ryan, the instant Brendon gets up to Spencer's room. Spencer shuts the door behind them and hisses, "Shh!" but Ryan ignores him. "Tell me I didn't go to all that effort for nothing," he says.

"What?" says Brendon, pulling off his jacket and draping it over the back of one of Spencer's chairs. "I had a good time."

Ryan groans. Even Spencer, who's looking kind of bleary-eyed and exhausted, seems interested. "Give me more than that, Urie," Ryan says. "What happened? Did he kiss you?"

Brendon feels like he goes still all over for a minute, like even his heart stops beating. Just for a second. Then, "Yeah," he says.

Ryan bounces up onto his knees. He's on Spencer's twin bed, looking weirdly normal in a t-shirt and boxers. His hair has no product in it and his face is bare of makeup and his long skinny legs are bare and kind of hairy. "Well?" he says. "What _happened?_"

"Nothing," says Brendon. "It was the slow dance, we kissed. People were looking." Ryan lets out a long, disappointed breath. "It's not _like_ that," Brendon says. "Stop being weird."

"You stop being weird," retorts Ryan at once. Brendon ignores him in favor of taking off his shirt, and his shoes, and unwinding the shiny red sash. There's a sleeping bag set up on the floor. So it's not like he really lied to his parents. Strictly speaking, he _is_ sleeping over at Spencer's.

"So nothing happened?" Spencer says quietly.

"No," says Brendon. He kicks off the dress pants and sits down on the floor, on top of the sleeping bag.

He's not expecting Spencer's hand on his shoulder. "Hey," Spencer says.

"Nothing happened," Brendon insists. "It wasn't like that, I told you."

Spencer ignores him completely and gives him a hug. Brendon doesn't try to struggle against it very much. Ryan peers down at him from the bed with a sympathetic expression.

"You are so far gone on him, aren't you," Spencer says eventually.

"Yeah," says Brendon to the floor.

He really is.  
_

Saturday and Sunday pass in a kind of blur. Brendon has a mild headache when he wakes up on Saturday morning – well, early Saturday afternoon – which he doesn't realize until later was probably a hangover. He goes home, he does his homework, he does more piano practice than he's ever bothered to do in one weekend before, life goes back to normal, no one texts him except Ryan. Ryan's text is about aubergines. Brendon is not entirely sure what an aubergine is. Then it's Monday and back to school again and somehow Brendon had almost forgotten that life would, in fact, keep going after prom. The senior class still hasn't actually graduated. There's still another week left of rehearsals before the school band does their summer show. Brendon still has to go into math class and face his lame math teacher, minus the wig, and stare at quadratic equations until his brain starts to ache.

He doesn't want to do any of it. He doesn't want to face anyone, he doesn't want to talk to anyone, he doesn't even know how to _begin_ talking to Jon now that it's all over and they're back to being just normal friends again. He doesn't know if he even wants to talk to Jon, and that's a horrible feeling all by itself, because Brendon always wants to talk to Jon. But he doesn't know what Jon's done about the whole thing – if he explained the joke to his friends, and what he said, or if he's just going to leave it to die a natural death and let people work it out for themselves, or... they never _talked_ about this bit. Brendon doesn't know what he's supposed to do.

He's so sunk in misery that it takes him until lunchtime to realize that he doesn't have to worry about not wanting to talk to anyone because, apparently, no one wants to talk to him. It's the vague prickle on the back of his neck that alerts him, the odd uncomfortable feeling that Brendon knows by now means that somewhere, somehow, Tom Conrad is watching you. He looks around the hallway and spots Tom lurking in the shadows by the stairs. Brendon meets his eyes by accident – he doesn't mean to. Last time he saw Tom he was in the middle of being dragged off for a threesome, and that's kind of awkward. But Tom doesn't come over or wave or anything – Tom just narrows his eyes and gives Brendon a poisonous glare before turning away.

Brendon looks down at his own feet. His heel is tapping incessantly against the floor and he can't seem to make it stop. The happy and sad faces on his sneakers look like they're making fun of him.

In the lunch hall, there's no place for Brendon at what he realizes he was starting to think of as _his_ table, _their_ table. Jon's there all right, but he's staring down at his own plate of food and doesn't look up once. Brendon's pretty sure Jon hasn't even seen him. And all Jon's friends are clustered protectively around him, and Tom glares at Brendon again, and Nick gives him a long sad look even though Brendon loaned Nick some money three days ago. Nick never gives that kind of look to people he thinks he can borrow more money from.

Brendon looks over at Max's table, with all the juniors he sort-of knows and likes there, but – Max is Tom's girlfriend's brother. Whatever the problem is that everyone has with Brendon all of a sudden, he probably shares it. Brendon takes his lunch and goes to find an empty classroom to eat by himself.

He doesn't know what's happened. Maybe when Jon admitted the trick to his friends, they were all relieved and said they'd never liked Brendon that much anyway, were just being nice to him for Jon. Maybe – maybe _Jon_ never liked Brendon that much anyway. Brendon doesn't know. Nothing else seems to make much sense.

They have band practice every night that week, leading up to the summer show. Brendon purposely gets there as late as he possibly can, and the teacher glares at him. When he makes his way to the back of the room, he finds that for the first time he can remember, Jon's sitting on the other side of Spencer and his drum kit.

Brendon thinks he probably ought to be relieved. It's easier all around if they just avoid the whole thing, and forget anything ever happened. Spencer keeps shooting him worried sideways looks during practice, and then turning and looking at Jon, and Brendon does his absolute best to ignore them both.  
_

Tuesday is basically the same as Monday, except it possibly sucks more because Brendon knows what to expect this time.  
_

Wednesday, Spencer corners Brendon after practice and says, "Okay, you're coming home with me."

"I'm fine," Brendon says unconvincingly.

Spencer's already got his phone out and is sending off a text message. "Ryan's coming over," he says as he taps send. "Come on."

At Spencer's house Spencer steers Brendon past the giggling twins – who apparently _still_ think Brendon's a crush object, even when Brendon's not actually all dressed up by Ryan Ross, and Brendon doesn't know what to think about this – and sits him down on the bed with a bowl of caramel popcorn. This is probably Spencer's version of being comforting. Ryan's already there. Sometimes Brendon wonders if Ryan actually lives at Spencer's house.

"Okay, what the fuck is going on," says Spencer.

"Fill me in?" says Ryan.

"Jon's being weird," Spencer explains. "Since Monday. And Brendon's miserable."

"I'm fine!" Brendon protests.

Spencer gives him a withering look. "You're wandering around looking like a house fell on your head. People keep asking me if you're okay."

"I... do they?" says Brendon. "Who?"

"Well, Max, after band yesterday," Spencer says. "And, um, Jon, actually."

"He did?" says Brendon slowly. He doesn't quite believe it. Why would Jon care?

"Well, he was pretty weird about it," Spencer says. "And sort of sideways. It took me a while to work out what he was talking about. Which brings me back to my point: Jon's being weird, you're being miserable, and I want to know what's going on."

"Nothing's going on," says Brendon. "Everything's fine."

Spencer says, "Do I need to punch Jon Walker next time I see him?"

"It's not Jon!" Brendon protests at once. Spencer looks at him skeptically. Brendon says, "I mean – it's not Jon's fault. He didn't do anything. Jon's a good guy," he insists. "And anyway there's – there's nothing wrong. So."

Spencer and Ryan exchange a look. Spencer and Ryan can say a lot to each other with a look, apparently. Spencer says, "Okay, if you say so. So you should come down to the garage and jam with us."

"What?" says Brendon. He's going to get whiplash from the way Spencer changes subjects.

"Yes," says Ryan. "We're all going to start a band."

The weird thing is, spending an entire afternoon in Spencer's garage messing around on guitar and piano and drums with Spencer and Ryan maybe shouldn't be so much of a distraction, but it is, it really is. It's getting dark when Brendon realizes that he hasn't thought about Jon or the whole awful situation once in the last two hours. His friends are maybe actually pretty good at being comforting. "Maybe we should do this for real," Brendon says. "Start a band."

Spencer raises his eyebrows. "What makes you think that wasn't exactly why I was cultivating your friendship all along?"

Brendon ducks his head and laughs a little bit. He does feel better. He feels a lot better. "Thanks, guys," he says.

By the time he falls asleep that night, though, his brain's circled back around to the Jon thing. He keeps thinking about the _kiss_. He almost wishes Jon hadn't kissed him at all. It was an unfair sort of thing to do, it made Brendon think about all sorts of things he can't have. Jon shouldn't have kissed him.

But then, Jon probably wouldn't have kissed him if he'd known. Jon's not that kind of guy, he wouldn't set out to break someone's heart. Brendon is sure of that. Even though there's absolutely no way he can think of to explain the way Jon's acting now that doesn't make Jon sound like a douche, Brendon _knows_ he's not like that. He rolls over in bed and rubs the back of his hand across his mouth. He wouldn't want Jon to take the kiss back anyway. Not really. He wouldn't give up the memory for anything.

Brendon falls asleep thinking about what Spencer said earlier, and wondering why Jon would ask _Spencer_ if Brendon's okay instead of just – instead of just talking to Brendon again.  
_

At Thursday lunch break Brendon checks his phone and finds a text from Greta.

It just says **hng in there, bb.** Brendon has absolutely no idea what that means. He sort of wishes for Ryan's aubergine dreams instead.

At band practice that day Spencer throws his sticks down to the ground, gets to his feet, drags Jon up by the collar and physically pulls him out of the room. The teacher is busy weeping at the flute section and doesn't notice. Brendon stares after them.

He's sort of impressed, actually. He knows Jon's kind of short, and Spencer's tall and pretty muscular for a fifteen-year-old – it's all the drumming – but he's not _that_ much bigger than Jon, and it's still not every day you see a sophomore physically force a senior to do anything. Spencer must be pretty angry, Brendon thinks. He looked pretty angry. Brendon doesn't really know why Spencer would bother to be angry with Jon. Brendon _explained_ that none of this is Jon's fault.

He looks down at his timpanis. Normally Brendon is pretty happy about getting to play the timpanis. There is nothing not awesome about enormous drums. For the last week or so he hasn't been able to muster up much excitement, though. For the first time in Brendon's life a teacher actually yelled at him to _put more energy into it, Brendon, more!_

If he strains he can hear raised voices coming from the hallway – well, voice, actually, it's just Spencer shouting, he can't hear Jon at all. He can't pick out the words. He tries not to listen. When he hears Spencer's voice rise and crack on, "-cking with his _head!_" he flushes all over, puts his head down, and determinedly doesn't look at Jon or Spencer when they come back into the practice room.

Spencer tries to make him come and hang out and jam in Spencer's garage again after school, but Brendon just goes home. He doesn't really feel like being with anyone right now.  
_

"Wait," says Jon after practice on Friday. "B, Brendon, wait – just a moment, please."

"I've got to get home," Brendon says. Jon's already gone a whole week without talking to Brendon. Brendon kind of gets the point. He doesn't like it all that much, but whatever.

Jon reaches out and catches Brendon by the wrist. "_Please_," he says. "Will you just –" he looks around. People are regarding them with interest. Brendon and Jon were a major topic of school gossip for a while there. "Meet me in the parking lot?" says Jon. "Please? I can give you a lift home."

"I don't need a lift," Brendon says. He doesn't. Usually he walks home.

"I need to talk to you," says Jon. He sounds like he means it. He looks a little desperate. Brendon bites his lip.

His phone beeps. Brendon scrabbles for it at once, thankful for the distraction, thankful for any reason to look away from Jon's eyes. When he flips it open there's a text waiting from Greta. Brendon reads it twice, confused.

"Why would Greta be talking about aubergines?" he says out loud without thinking, before he remembers who's talking to him.

Jon's still standing there when he looks up. "I... really don't know," he says. "I could ask her? If that helps?" He's scratching at the back of his own neck with his thumb and fingernail. Brendon knows that gesture, Jon does it when he's nervous.

Brendon presses his lips together and looks back down at his phone so he doesn't have to meet Jon's eyes. "I have to get my stuff," he says. "I'll see you outside."

He turns and walks away before Jon can answer. He doesn't know what Jon wants. Brendon _hates_ this. When he gets to his locker, he stares into it for a long moment like it's going to give him some advice. Like, 'Don't bother, he just wants to make it official that you aren't going to talk to each other anymore, hide in the practice room and save yourself some hurt.'

Someone touches him on the shoulder. Brendon jumps. Spencer says, "What did he want?"

"I don't know," says Brendon.

"He didn't," Spencer cocks his head, "he didn't say anything?"

"I think I'm just going to go home," says Brendon.

Spencer says, "Don't do that."

Brendon puts his hands in his pockets.

"Give him a chance," says Spencer. "I was talking to him yesterday and – you were right, he's not a bad guy."

Brendon says, "Okay," very, very quietly.

The parking lot is nearly empty. Jon's leaning against his battered old car, head down, arms crossed, hugging himself. Brendon stands in the school doorway and looks at him and feels a weird achy sensation in his chest. Jon looks _sad_. It isn't fair. Brendon wants to run over there and wrap his arms around him.

He walks instead, concentrating on his own footsteps, crunch crunch against the gravel in the parking lot. He holds onto the strap of his schoolbag like it's a lifeline, his knuckles going white around it. Jon hears him coming when Brendon's maybe halfway to the car, and he looks up sharply and watches Brendon the rest of the way. Brendon feels horribly self-conscious. He's wearing the tight jeans Ryan made him buy with an ancient Bible camp t-shirt. Ryan, he feels sure, would not be impressed.

"Hi," calls Jon, when Brendon's close enough to hear.

Brendon walks the rest of the way over to the car and says, "Hi."

Jon gives him an earnest look. "Is it okay if I – if we talk? I've got some stuff to say."

Brendon says, "Sure."

"Okay," says Jon. He licks his lips. "Okay."

Brendon takes his schoolbag off his shoulder and drops it at his feet. He keeps a hold of the strap. It gives him something to look at when he says, "So talk."

"I never asked you to prom," Jon says.

Brendon feels his ribcage constrict with unhappiness. He doesn't look up. It's obvious what's going on now. In spite of everything, Jon's noticed how Brendon feels – or maybe Spencer told him, the dick – and now he feels like he's got to say something nice and make it absolutely clear exactly how hopeless Brendon's feelings are. Brendon already _knows_ it's hopeless. He should have ignored Spencer and just gone on home.

"I never – I wasn't even _thinking_ about you like that," says Jon, who is apparently determined to make this as awful for Brendon as possible. "Not that – I mean, we were friends, but I was hung up on Cassie for ages, and then it was nearly the end of the school year, and I don't know, I didn't feel like it was fair to go looking for someone again." Out of the corner of his eye, Brendon sees him rub at the back of his neck. "I'm going to college, you know? In fall."

Brendon makes some kind of vague affirmative noise. He can't decide if it makes things better or worse that he's probably never going to see Jon again once school finishes.

"But –" Jon makes a frustrated noise. "Look, I've – I've just got to say this, and get it off my chest, and if you hate it you can – I don't know, just pretend it never happened, and you don't have to see me again after school's done anyway."

Brendon's barely listening. He's still concentrating very hard on his own hands where they're tight around the strap of his bag. He thinks if he looks up he might cry, and honestly, could he get any more pathetic?

He misses Jon's question the first time he asks.

"Brendon?" says Jon tentatively after a moment.

Brendon bites down hard on the inside of his lip and looks up. He's _not_ this pathetic, dammit. "Sorry, what?" he says.

Jon's arms are hanging loosely by his sides, but his hands are curled in, skin stretched around the knuckles. Brendon recognizes forced-casual when he sees it. "I said," says Jon, "will you go to prom with me?"

Brendon blinks. "We already went to prom," he says blankly.

"I know," says Jon. "But I never asked you. So I'm asking now." He swallows. "Will you?"

Brendon's breath catches. He can't think what to say. Jon _can't_ mean – he can't mean what Brendon wants him to mean, so Brendon just stares at him, confused.

"It's just," says Jon, and he crosses his arms defensively, "I really, really like you, I don't – I didn't mean to, but I do. I like being with you and I like talking to you and I like the way you smile and I _really_ like the way your ass looks in those jeans, and," he takes a deep breath, "I want you to come to a stupid school dance with me. I liked being your fake boyfriend and I want," he meets Brendon's eyes, "I want it not to be fake."

"But you just – you didn't talk to me for a week!" says Brendon.

Jon shuffles his feet in their flip-flops. "You went all weird," he says. "After I kissed you. I thought maybe – and then I thought I was wrong, and then you _left_. I kind of went back to the party and got shitfaced afterward," he confesses. "I didn't – I didn't want to tell them the truth. I think everyone thinks you dumped me."

On prom night, wow, and suddenly it makes sense that all Jon's friends suddenly think Brendon's an asshole. Brendon keeps staring at him. There's something bright and disbelieving bubbling inside of him.

"And I thought I couldn't face it," Jon says, "But Spencer yelled at me, and – I realize I've been kind of a dick. I'm sorry. So I have to -" Jon shrugs sadly. "Just go ahead and say no. I had to ask."

"You thought I'd say _no_?" Brendon whispers.

Jon looks up sharply.

Brendon doesn't think he can actually smile wide enough for all the happiness that's suddenly inside him, but his face feels like it might start to hurt from trying. He lets go of his bag's strap, finally, and it falls in the gravel. "Jon," he says, enunciating clearly, "I would love to go to prom with you."

Jon's looking right at him. His mouth falls open a little bit.

"I have the biggest, lamest crush in the _world_ on you," Brendon goes on, "and you've got to be the only person who doesn't – hey!"

Suddenly his back's against the car door and Jon's body is pressed warm against his from hips to shoulders. Jon's hands land on Brendon's biceps. "Say that again," he says.

"What, I've got a crush on you?" says Brendon, grinning. Jon's eyes are bright. "I can't believe you didn't notice, Ryan and Spencer kept _laughing_ at me –"

He's cut off there because Jon kisses him, sliding his hands into Brendon's hair and tugging him forward, pushing their mouths together. There's still that moment of _weird_ right at the start and then it's even better than Brendon remembers, wet mouths sliding together, and then Jon nudges at Brendon's lips with his tongue and Brendon's mouth is opening automatically and it's even _better_, strange and new and so, so hot. Brendon closes his eyes and clings to Jon's shoulders and kisses back enthusiastically, and Jon shoves one of his legs between Brendon's and crowds him back against the car and breaks the kiss just for an instant to say, "Oh my god, B, you have no idea, I've been going _crazy_ –"

"Less talking, more kissing," Brendon orders, and pulls Jon's head back down again. Jon laughs against his mouth and wraps his arms around him and kisses him and kisses him and kisses him, right there in the school parking lot.

Brendon's phone buzzes in his pocket. Brendon reaches for it without breaking the kiss, meaning to switch it off, but Jon pulls away and says, "What is it?"

"Um," says Brendon, flipping the phone open. _You have a new text message!_ it tells him. He opens the message up. He has to read it twice; Jon is running his hands up and down Brendon's back and it's kind of distracting.

"Did you say Greta goes to the Catholic school?" he says after a moment.

"Yeah, why?" says Jon.

**sry bout that ross took my phone**, Brendon reads again. **ps tell jwalk get his act together or face the consequences**

"Just, Ryan goes to the Catholic school too," he says.

"Spencer's Ryan?" says Jon.

"Yeah," says Brendon. He turns the phone around and shows it to Jon. He can feel a giggle bubbling up in his throat. "I think she knew what we were up to all along."

Jon stares down at the phone, and then he stares at Brendon. After a second they both start to laugh, Jon tucking his face into Brendon's neck and muffling his chuckles there, Brendon tipping his head back and snickering. A minute later Jon turns and bites at the underside of Brendon's jaw, and Brendon's laugh turns into a gasp midway, and then they're kissing some more. "We're going to get caught by a teacher," Brendon manages to mumble after a few hot, delirious minutes.

"I really don't care," says Jon, and kisses him again.


End file.
